Teen Birth Across Generations Among Non-Latino Whites and African-American Women: The Effect of Race and Neighborhood Income

Objectives: To examine the extent to which lifelong neighborhood income modifies the generational association of teen birth among White and AA women in Cook County, IL.

Methods: Stratified and multilevel logistic regression analyses were conducted on the Illinois transgenerational dataset of singleton births (1989-1991) to non-Latina White and AA mothers (born 1956-1976) with appended U.S. census income information. We calculated rates and risks of teen births according to race, maternal age, and lifelong neighborhood economic environment.

Results: Teen birth occurred at a rate of 9.5% and 52.9% for White and AA women, respectively. White women whose mothers were teens when they were born had an over five-fold increased risk of becoming teen mothers themselves. For AA women, the risk was smaller, but statistically significant. For both races, women who experienced downward economic mobility had the highest risk of teen birth, while women with upward mobility had the lowest risk, even compared to women in lifelong high income neighborhoods. While White women exposed to lifelong low income had almost threefold increased risk of teen birth compared to those in lifelong high income neighborhoods, AA women in lifelong high and lifelong low income neighborhoods had similar risk of teen birth.

Conclusions for practice: Understanding the racial differences in intergenerational patterns of teen birth is important for effective program planning and policy making, given that interventions targeted at daughters of teen mothers may differ in effectiveness for White and AA teens.