Teen Pregnancy

Introduction

Teen pregnancy is commonly defined as a pregnancy by a woman who has not reached the age of majority in her country. Sub-Saharan Africa has the highest teenage pregnancy rate in the world at 143 per 1,000 women, while South Korea has the lowest at 3 per 1,000 women. The United States has the highest teenage birthrate in the developed world at 53 per 1,000 women and also has a high rate of teenage abortion (Bell, 265).

Teenage pregnancy has always occurred, but in recent years, many in the United States have defined it as a serious problem. Teen pregnancy is associated with negative outcomes for both mother and child. It is also associated with contested political and moral ideologies. The history of the concept of teenage pregnancy, the outcomes of teen pregnancy, and social policies all inform how U.S. society treats the issue (Edin, 210).

Discussion and Analysis

Teenage pregnancy was, in fact, more common in the United States before 1950 than it is today. Though teen pregnancy in the United States has decreased since 1950, with a sharp decline since the 1990s, it has been increasingly defined as a social problem, with lawmakers and citizens convinced that something needs to be done to reduce the number of children born to teenagers and unmarried women. In many societies around the world, marriage is a primary measure of whether a woman is “ready” to have a child. (Edin, 300) In societies in which the average age of marriage is younger, teenage pregnancy is not seen as a social problem, since most pregnant teenagers are married. In the United States, people now delay marriage well beyond the teenage years. Thus, what is considered an acceptable age for pregnancy has continued to rise. Also fueling the concern is the association between teenage pregnancy and poor women of color. African Americans and Latinas have higher rates of teenage pregnancy; they are also more likely than white women to contend with racism, poverty, and the stigma attached to teenage pregnancy. Despite these social inequalities, individual explanations and remedies for this problem predominate political discourse. Structural understandings and solutions to these racial and class disparities receive much less attention (Bell, 265).

Outcomes of Teenage Pregnancy

Health

Fewer teenage pregnancies in the United States, 34 percent in 2002, are ending in abortion than in previous decades. Thus, more teenage pregnancies now end in teenage parenthood. There are mixed medical opinions as to ...