Internal poverty and teen pregnancy.
The subjects for the present study were drawn from the female students who participated in the National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS) initial eighth-grade data collection. Adolescent females who later became pregnant were matched on race, birth month, and birth year with adolescent females who did not report a pregnancy. The study examined selected predictor variables from the baseline 1988 wave of data in relation to the outcome variable of pregnancy status. Results indicated a statistically significant difference in locus of control between those females who later became pregnant and those who later did not experience a pregnancy during adolescence. Those who later became pregnant were much more likely to have an external locus of control (p = .0001). Females who later became pregnant were also more likely to have a poorer sense of personal efficacy (p = .0001). Finally, females who later experienced a teen pregnancy had more traditional occupational expectations (p = .006) and lower educational expectations (p = .001) than did those who did not later report a teen pregnancy.
Young
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Program in Human Development and Family Science, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, USA. heal00@aol.com
Martin
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Young
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Ting
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D000293:Adolescent; D001240:Aspirations, Psychological; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D010553:Personality Development; D011247:Pregnancy; D011253:Pregnancy in Adolescence / Q000523:psychology*; D012307:Risk Factors; D020377:Self Efficacy; D014481:United States