Teenage Pregnancy Research Report - 3p Consulting

Teen pregnancy and socio-economic disadvantageOne area of investigation that has been examinedin both types of research is the association betweenteen pregnancy and motherhood and socio-economicdisadvantage and the impact this has in the lives ofpregnant teens. The most recent research agreesthat many teenagers who choose to continue withtheir pregnancy are faced with multiple economic andsocial disadvantages that are likely to persist whetheror not they are mothers. In 2006, in-depth qualitativeand quantitative research was conducted across theUK with 41 teenagers who planned their pregnancies. 1The results of the research revealed that all of theseyoung mothers experienced a range of indicative lifecircumstances during childhood and in the year prior tobecoming pregnant. The authors described the kinds ofmaterial and emotional indicators that the young mothersthey interviewed had experienced. Furthermore theyconcluded that these factors were instrumental in theyoung women’s decision to become mothers.Material disadvantage in childhood• Parents separated or divorced;• Parents unemployed or in manual jobs;• Moved areas frequently;• ‘Disliked’ area/location;• Public housing;• Numerous siblings or overcrowded accommodation;• Money being ‘a worry’;• Poor health and health of immediate family;• Evidence of alcohol and/or drugs misuse within thefamily, and;• Family claiming benefits.Material disadvantage in the year prior topregnancy:• Unsettled living arrangements, for example thrownout of home or living in temporary accommodation;• Dissatisfaction with education, and;• Lack of money due to unemployment, working in amanual job, or at school or college (but wanting toleave).Emotional disadvantage:• Negative relationships in the immediate family (that is,violent and volatile);• Bullying at school;• Lack of open communication, and feeling unable totell anyone in the family about personal issues;• Lack of encouragement, for example regardingeducation, ambitions and general life direction, and;• Separation from their partner with whom they becamepregnant intentionally.As well as being to some extent a result of disadvantageand poverty, parenting as a teenager has also beenshown to increase the chances that the cycle is likelyto persist. Work undertaken in Australia in 2006tracked outcomes for young mothers showing that notonly is early motherhood strongly associated with loweducational achievement and poverty but also that theirrelative disadvantage increases over time. 2 Almost allteenage mothers are reliant on income support paymentsand have low levels of education. By the time they are intheir early 30s, women who were teenage mothers areless likely to be partnered, and if they are partnered theyare more likely to have a low-income partner, and lesslikely to be purchasing their own home. Additionally, thesame data analysis shows that marginalisation of thisgroup has increased with the gap between the outcomesfor teenage mothers and her non-parenting counterpartwidening over the past 20 years.55