Sexual Intercourse and Pregnancy among African American Adolescent Girls in High-Poverty Neighborhoods: The Role of Family and Perceived Community Environment

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Abstract
Data are used from a random sample of African-American families living in poor urban communities to address three questions: 1) How well do socialization, supervision, and marital transition hypotheses explain the relationship between family structure and the probability of sexual debut and pregnancy for black adolescents in disadvantaged neighborhoods? 2) How does the quality of the parent-child relationship relate to the probability of initiating sex and experiencing a pregnancy for girls in these neighborhoods? And 3) given a context of structural disadvantage, to what extent is an individual's ability to participate in the more socially organized aspects of her community correlated with delayed sexual activity? There is limited support for socialization, supervision, and marital transition hypotheses as explanations for the probability of sexual debut and pregnancy. Stronger parent-child relationships are associated with delayed sexual onset, but are not related to pregnancy experience. Adolescents' perceptions of social support and cohesion among neighborhood adults are correlated with a decreased probability of pregnancy, while the odds of pregnancy are higher for teenagers with no working adults in their social networks.
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