Jun 19, 1986 - ence to compare rates of early childbearing among White, Black,. Mexican-origin and ... This paper, submitted to the Journal January 29, 1986,.
Childbearing among Young Latino Women in the United States KATHERINE F. DARABI, PHD,
AND
VILMA ORTIZ, PHD
Abstract: We analyzed 1979 and 1982 data from the Youth Cohort of the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS) of Labor Market Experience to compare rates of early childbearing among White, Black, Mexican-origin and Puerto Rican women up to age 21. Latino young women fall in between the extremely low rate of the Whites and the extremely high rate of the Blacks. Mexican and Puerto Rican young women have similar proportions of premarital first births, but the
marital first birth rate for young Mexicans is twice that of the Puerto Ricans. The bulk of Mexican first births, like births to Whites, occur within marriage, while Puerto Rican first births are similar to those of Blacks, the majority being out-of-wedlock. These racial/ethnic differences in premarital first birth rates do not change greatly when socioeconomic status, and birthplace of respondents and respondents' parents are controlled. (Am J Public Health 1987; 77:25-28.)
Introduction The past decade has seen a spate of research studies and papers on adolescent sexual activity and childbearing among Black and White teenagers in the United States. Far less is known about these behaviors among Latino youth. According to figures from the Current Population Surveys (CPS), the fertility of Latino teenagers falls between that of non-Latino Blacks and Whites. In the 1979 CPS, for example, nevermarried Latino women ages 18-19 had borne over three times as many children as never-married Whites, but only half as many as the never-married Black women in that age group.' In 1980, the teenage fertility rate for Latinos was 82.2, compared to 41.2 for Whites, and 105.1 for Blacks.2 There are equally large intra-Latino fertility differentials. Mexican-origin young women have markedly higher birth rates than other Latinos. Beyond differences in rates by country of origin, little is known about whether the variation in the fertility rates of young women results from differences in the proportions who come from low status backgrounds, or who are recent immigrants. Marital status is another variable about which there is little information. The purpose of this paper is to compare rates of early childbearing among White, Black, Mexican-origin, and Puerto Rican young women, controlling for marital, socioeconomic, and generational statuses. Methods The analysis is based on the Youth Cohort of the National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS) of Labor Market Experience.3 The NLS is conducted by the Center for Human Resource Research of Ohio State University; data are collected by the National Opinion Research Center; funding is provided by the US Department of Labor. The sample was initially obtained in 1979, with reinterviews conducted every year since 1979. The initial response rate was 90 per cent, with follow-up rates for the reinterviews of approximately 96 per cent. Data were collected by means of face-to-face interviews with respondents. The cohort of 12,686 youths is nationally representative of the 14 to 21 year old population in the US in 1979. Respondents were selected on the basis of a multi-stage, stratified area probability sample of households and group quarters, in which Blacks, Latinos, and disadvantaged Whites were oversampled. The survey also included a supplemental sample of youth in the military.
Variables
Address reprint requests to Katherine F. Darabi, PhD, Assistant Professor of Public Health, Center for Population and Family Health, Columbia University, 60 Haven Avenue, New York, NY 10032. Dr. Ortiz is a research consultant at the Center. This paper, submitted to the Journal January 29, 1986, was revised and accepted for publication June 19, 1986. © 1986 American Journal of Public Health 009040036/87$1.50
AJPH January 1987, Vol. 77, No. 1
Race/Ethnicity-The race/ethnicity variable was derived from responses to the following question: What is your origin or descent? CODE ALL THAT APPLY. Black, Afro-American, or Negro Chinese English Filipino or Philipino French German Greek Hawaiian or Pacific Islander Indian-American, or Native American Indian-Asian Irish Italian Japanese Korean Latino or Spanish Descent Cuban or Cubano Chicano Mexican or Mexican-American Puerto Rican, Puertorriqueno, or Borincano Other Latino, Hispano, or Latin-American Descent Other Spanish Descent Polish Portuguese Russian Scottish Vietnamese Welsh Other (Specify) If Volunteered: American or None For our analyses the priority for assigning race/ethnicity was as follows: 1) Latino or Spanish descent (referred to as "Latino"). 2) Non-Latino Black, Afro-American or Negro. 3) Non-Latino White (i.e., persons identified as American or as a group of European descent). Groups of other racial/ethnic descent were excluded from the analysis. Table 1 presents the number of White, Black, and Latino respondents in the sample. The diversity of Latino groups in sheer numbers, geographic location, migration history, and other characteristics clearly illustrates the importance of disaggregating by national origin. In the NLS, there are sufficient numbers of Mexican-origin* and *We use the term "Mexican-origin" in this paper to convey the diversity of this population, ranging from recent immigrants (many of whom label
25
DARABI AND ORTIZ TABLE 1-Weighted and Unweighted Distribution of Respondents by Race/Ethnicity, NLS, 1982 Race/Ethnicity All Groups Whites Blacks Latinos Total Latinos Mexicans Puerto Ricans
Cubans Other Latinos Total Latinos
Weighted Per Cent
Unweighted Per Cent
Per Cent with a First Premarital Birth
(Unweighted N) (3,258) (1,473) (958)
78 15 7 100
26 17 100
(5,689)
62 16 6 17 100
63 16 5 16 100
(607) (152) (50) (149) (958)
57
TABLE 2-Weighted Per Cent of Women Who Had a First Birth before Age 22 by Race/Ethnicity, NLS, 1982
Race/Ethnicity
(Unweighted N)
Per Cent with a First Birth
Whites Blacks Latinos Mexicans Puerto Ricans Cubans
(3,258) (1,473) (958) (607) (152) (50)
19.2 41.3 32.3 38.0 30.1 8.6
Puerto Rican women to present separately in the fertility analyses. Cuban and other Latino-origin women are also excluded from these analyses. Fertility-The fertility data used in this study are from the 1982 survey round, in which detailed information on pregnancy, fertility, and contraceptive use was obtained from the respondents. The detailed fertility histories included the dates and outcomes of every birth and pregnancy. In this analysis, we focus solely onfirst births that occur before the age of 22, and then differentiate between marital and premarital first births. Premarital first births were those that occurred before the respondent turned 22 years of age, or the data of first marriage, whichever was earliest. For respondents who were not yet 22 years old at the time of the 1982 wave (i.e., the 17- to 21-year-olds), the date of the interview or date of first marriage, whichever is earliest, is used. By using the detailed retrospective history regarding the timing of births, analyses of early premarital fertility in the NLS can be based on all women rather than just the youngest respondents in the survey. Socioeconomic Status-Respondents' reports of father's education, mother's education, and father's occupation were used to determine socioeconomic status (SES). Father's occupation was recoded to status scores based on Nam, et al.4 In order to make the scales comparable, the three indicators were transformed to z-scores and then averaged together. For the sake of simplicity, the SES scale is divided into three categories with approximately equal numbers of respondents. Generation-Generation is defined as follows: first generation means the respondent was born in a foreign country or Puerto Rico; second generation means the respondent was themselves "Mexicanos") to those who have been in the US for many generations (and who may use many different terms, including Hispanic, Mexican-American and Chicano, to describe themselves). We occasionally abbreviate the term Mexican-origin to Mexican for simpler prose style.
26
TABLE 3-Weighted Per Cent of Women Who Had a First Premarital Birth before Age 22 by Race/Ethnicity, NLS, 1982
Socioeconomic Status Low SES %
(unweighted n) Mid SES % (unweighted n) High SES %
(unweighted n)
White
Mexican
Puerto Rican
Black
8.1 (1024)
10.3 (451)
20.2 (105)
38.2 (779)
6.8 (1107)
19.1 (109)
14.8 (36)
33.9 (534)
1.2 (1127)
13.5 (47)
(11)
12.9 (160)
*Insufficient cell size for inclusion.
born in the continental United States, and one or both parents were born in a foreign country or Puerto Rico; third generation means the respondent and both parents were born in the Us. Analysis The subsequent analysis focuses on the percentages of women who had a first birth, and the percentages who had premarital or marital first births, up to and including age 21. These percentages are weighted to estimate their occurrences in the population.**
Results Table 2 presents the per cent of women in each racial/ethnic group who had a first birth by age 21 or earlier. With the exception of the Cubans, there is a dramatic contrast between the low rate among White young women and the higher rates among minority group women.*** When we disaggregate the data in Table 2 by marital status at the time of first birth, the picture changes markedly (Figure 1). The premarital first birth rates of the Mexicanorigin and Puerto Rican young women fall in between the extremely low rate of the Whites and the extremely high rate of the Blacks. Mexican-origin and Puerto Rican women differ in proportion of marital first births depicted in Figure 1. The bulk of Mexican first births, like births to Whites, occur within marriage, while first births to Puerto Rican young women are like births to Blacks in that they are more likely to be premarital. Some of the racial/ethnic differences in premarital births are modified when data are analyzed by socioeconomic levels, due to the fact that Mexican-origin women in the lowest SES group have a particularly low rate of premarital first births (Table 3). Figure 2 displays the proportion of total first births to young women occurring out of wedlock in each racial/ethnic and SES category. Premarital births are inversely related to socioeconomic status except among Mexican-origin women where the opposite holds. **The sampling weights provided by Ohio State University take into account the probability of selection into the sample (i.e., adjusting for oversampling of Blacks, Latinos, and disadvantaged Whites) differential response rates (e.g., for geographic areas), and random variation associated with sampling which is identified from independently derived population totals. ***Cubans are not included in subsequent analyses because of their small sample size.
AJPH January 1987, Vol. 77, No. 1
CHILDBEARING AMONG YOUNG LATINO WOMEN IN THE UNITED STATES FIRST BIRTHS BY AGE 21 Weighted Percent of Women Who Have Had a First Birth by Race/Ethnicity and Marital Status Promor -~~~~~~~~~~~
4h0
4l0
e
-
.0 28-
FIGURE 1-First Births by Age 21: Weighted Per Cent of Women Who Have Had a First birth by Race/Ethnicity and Marital Status
PREMARITAL BIRTHS Weighted Percent of All First Births to Young Women Which Were Premarital by Race/Ethnicity and SES
90
Lo SES
=> 00d
-
Mid SES Hi SES
70-
-u60-
L
0)
5 40
30
20-
10
White
Mex
P.R.
Block
FIGURE 2-Pretnarital Births: Weighted Per Cent of AU First Births to Young Women Which Were Premarital by Race/Ethnicity and Socioeconomic Status (SES)
There also appears to be a generational effect on the frequency of premarital births among Mexican-origin women, with later generations having proportionately more premarital births than earlier generations (Table 4). For third generation Mexicans SES had no relation to premarital births. There were too few Puerto Ricans to support similar stratification of this group. Discussion Perhaps the most notable finding in our research is the marked differences in fertility behavior among Latino groups. Since Puerto Ricans are concentrated in northeast urban areas, Cubans in Miami, and Mexicans in California and the AJPH January 1987, Vol. 77, No. 1
southwest, it is difficult to separate fertility differences among these Latino groups from geographic impacts. In some ways the birth experience of young Puerto Rican women appears to be closer to Blacks than to women of Mexican-origin or Whites. The behavior of the Mexican-origin young women contrasts sharply with that of Puerto Rican and other young women. One plausible explanation of these findings could be that Mexican-origin women marry at very early ages, and therefore there are few women in the premarital childbearing category. This, however, is not the case, since the Puerto Rican women in our study have a slightly lower mean age at marriage than the Mexican-origin women. A different interpretation is that norms proscribing premarital sexual activity are particularly strong in the 27
DARABI AND ORTIZ TABLE 4-Weighted Per Cent of Mexican-origin Women with a Premarital First Birth before Age 22 by Socioeconomic and Generational Status NLS, 1982
Socioeconomic and Generational Status Low SES Generation Generation Generation Middle SES Generation Generation
Per Cent with a Premarital First Birth
(Unweighted N)
8.2 6.9 14.1
(128) (141) (182)
18.5
(10) (21) (78)
15.7
(5) (39)
1 2 3
1 2 Generation 3 High SES Generation 1 Generation 2 Generation 3
(3)
fertility that persist within socioeconomic categories are consistent with the "subcultural differences" theory that explain racial/ethnic differences in adult marital fertility.5 There appear to be strong cultural norms and values proscribing early premarital sexual activity, but endorsing high rates of marital fertility and large completed family size. In fact, although Mexican-origin young women have lower overall fertility rates than Blacks, at later ages they surpass Black women in both current and cumulative fertility.2 Our findings regarding the effect of generational status suggest that this variable may be an important determinant of the fertility of young women. Initially observed significant differences in premarital fertility between low and middle level SES Mexican-origin women were eliminated by a control for generational status. Measures of generation and assimilation would be an important addition to future studies of racial/ethnic differences in early fertility.
Insufficient cell size for inclusion.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Mexican community. In the General Social Surveys, for example, Mexican-origin and White adults are much less approving of premarital sex than are Black respondents.t As Mexican-origin young women are distanced from these traditional norms in successive generations, they may be more likely to engage in premarital sexual activity and, consequently, to bear their first children outside of marriage. This is further borne out by the finding that rates of sexual activity for third generation Mexican-origin young women (not shown) are double the rates of the first generation women (40.9 per cent and 18.5 per cent, respectively). The Mexican-White differences in marital and premarital tDarabi K, Namerow P, Philliber S: The fertility-related attitudes of Mexican Americans. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Population Assn. of America, 1983.
This is a revised version of a paper presented at the American Public Health Association 113th Annual Meeting, Washington, DC, November 1985. The research was supported by a grant from the Carnegie Corporation. The opinions expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Carnegie Corporation. The authors would like to thank Jay Kantor, Amy Koff, and Zenobia Ferguson for invaluable assistance in data preparation.
REFERENCES
1. US Bureau of the Census: Persons of Spanish origin in the United States, March 1979 (Advance Report). Current Population Reports Series P-20 (347). Washington, DC: The Bureau, 1980. 2. US National Center for Health Statistics: Births of Hispanic Parentage, 1979. NCHS Monthly Vital Statistics Report 1982; 31(2) (Suppl). 3. Center for Human Resource Research: The National Longitudinal Surveys Handbook, Rev. Ed. Columbus, OH: Ohio State University, 1983. 4. Nam C, LaRocque J, Powers M, Holmberg J: Occupational status scores: stability and change. Proceedings of the Social Statistics Section of the American Statistical Association, Washington, DC, 1975; 570-575. 5. Bean F, Curtis RL, Marcum JP: Familism and marital satisfaction among Mexican Americans. J Marr Fam 1977; 39:759-767.
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