The role of peer relations in childhood
and behavioral and family characteristics in early adolescence as risk factors for adolescent
childbearing was investigated. Sociometric surveys across third, fourth, and fifth grade and
parent and child measures of behavioral and family functioning at sixth and eighth grade were
collected in a lower income, urban sample of 308 African American females. Results replicated
earlier findings on the role of childhood aggression as a predictor of teen motherhood. In
addition, girls who displayed stable patterns of childhood aggression were at significantly higher
risk not only to have children as teenagers but to have more children and to have children at
younger ages. Results also indicated that females who were depressed in midadolescence were at
greater risk to become parents between age 15 and 19 years. These findings demonstrate the need
to take a differentiated approach to understanding teen childbearing and varying developmental
pathways in the prediction of teen motherhood.
Educational reviews on the performance of African American and Latino children often focus on failures, difficulties, and a lack of positive school and family factors that diminish rather than support accomplishments. We hear much about the existence of the achievement gap, but little about what is being done to successfully address it for children of color (Coleman, Winn, & Harradine, 2012). Despite major efforts, there remains a substantial imbalance of membership of children of color in programs for gifted students
Recent scholarship concerning low rates of marriage among low-income mothers emphasizes generalized gender distrust as a major impediment in forming sustainable intimate unions. Guided by symbolic interaction theory and longitudinal ethnographic data on 256 low-income mothers from the Three-City Study, we argue that generalized gender distrust may not be as influential in shaping mothers’ unions as some researchers suggest. Grounded theory analysis revealed that 96% of the mothers voiced a general distrust of men, yet that distrust did not deter them from involvement in intimate unions. Rather, the pivotal ways mothers enacted trust in their partners were demonstrated by 4 emergent forms of interpersonal trust that we labeled as suspended, compartmentalized, misplaced, and integrated. Implications for future research are discussed.
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