Teenage childbearing as an alternative life-course strategy in multigeneration black families.
This paper summarizes the findings of a three-year exploratory qualitative study of teenage childbearing in 20 low-income multigeneration black families. Teenage childbearing in these families is part of an alternative life-course strategy created in response to socioenvironmental constraints. This alternative life-course strategy is characterized by an accelerated family timetable; the separation of reproduction and marriage; an age-condensed generational family structure; and a grandparental child-rearing system. The implications of these patterns for intergenerational family roles are discussed.
Department of Individual and Family Studies, College of Human Development, Pennsylvania State University, 16802, University Park, PA.
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LM
Burton