Maternal Maturity and Maltreatment

Etiology of child maltreatment: A developmental€cological analysis.

“…Consistent with such evolutionary theorizing, Malkin and Lamb (in press) found that children living with a female relative who was past her reproductive prime were less at risk of severe maltreatment than children living with younger and more reproductively capable female relatives. Note that although this finding is not inconsistent with more sociologically driven research showing an inverse relation between maternal age and child abuse and neglect (Benedict et al, 1985;Connelly & Straus, 1992;Creighton, 1985;Egeland & Brunnquell, 1979;Whipple & Webster-Stratton, 1991;Zuravin, 1988a), resulting in large part from elevated rates of maltreatment among teenage parents (Bolton & Laner, 1981;Conger, McCarty, Yang, Lahey, & Kropp, 1984;Herrenkohl & Herrenkohl, 1979;Levanthal, 1981; but see Murphy et al, 1985 andGrief, 1989, for failures to replicate), the Malkin and Lamb (in press) data are distinct. They deal not merely with older women, but specifically with those at or near the end of their reproductive years.…”

Predicting Adolescent Mothers' Transition to Adulthood

“…Additionally, Whitman et al (1987) underscored the work of Russell (1980), commenting that adolescents, because they are making an off-time transition to parenting, are likely to perceive greater stress specifically associated with their parenting role. Numerous studies supported the general validity of these models (Baldwin & Cain, 1980;Bates, 1980;Bolton, 1990;Bolton & Laner, 1981;Field, Morrow, & Adlestein, 1993;Frey, Greenberg & Fewell, 1989;McKenry, Browne, Kotch, & Symons, 1990;Miller, Heysek, Whitman, & Borkowski, in press;Passino et al, 1993;Schinke, Barth, Gilchrist, & Maxwell, 1986;Sornmer et al, 1993). Although these models were designed to understand the antecedents of parenting, they may also be helpful in determining the influences on parents' functioning in general.…”

Child maltreatment and teenage first births: A relationship mediated by chronic sociodemographic stress?

“…On the other hand, there is considerable evidence of a delayed relationship between teenage motherhood and child maltreatment (Bolton & Laner, 1981; Creighton, 1985; Conger et al, 1984; Herrenkohl & Herrenkohl, 1979; Kent, 1973; Leventhal, 1981; Zuravin, 1987). Creighton’s study (1985) of more than 5,000 reported incidents of child maltreatment occurring in England during the years 1977 to 1982 found motherhood prior to 20 years of age significantly overrepresented among families reported for both abuse and neglect: 35.3% of the mothers of abused children and 30% of the mothers of neglected children, compared to 10.7% of mothers of families belonging to the blue collar classes, were less than 20 years old when they became mothers.…”