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Title: Effects of Family Instability, Income, and Income Instability on the Risk of a Premarital Birth
Resulting in 1 citation.
1. Wu, Lawrence L.
Effects of Family Instability, Income, and Income Instability on the Risk of a Premarital Birth
American Sociological Review 61,3 (June 1996): 386-406.
Also: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2096355
Cohort(s): NLSY79
Publisher: American Sociological Association
Keyword(s): Adolescent Fertility; Childbearing; Childbearing, Premarital/Nonmarital; Divorce; Family Income; Family Structure; First Birth; Household Composition; Income; Marriage; Parental Influences; Social Environment

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Previous work by Lawrence L. Wu & Brian C. Martinson (see SA 41:4/9304117) reported (1) a strong & statistically significant association between frequent changes in the numbers & types of parental figures a young woman has lived with & her risk of bearing her first child out of wedlock, & (2) weak & statistically nonsignificant associations between measures of a young woman's exposure to a mother-only family during childhood & adolescence & this risk. A serious limitation of these findings is the absence of controls for income. Here, prospective income histories & retrospective parental histories from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (N = 1,471 white & 766 black women ages 14-29 in 1979) were examined to determine if the effect of family instability on premarital births is an artifact of low, unstable, or declining family income. While low income is found to be associated with significantly increased premarital birth risks, the effects of income & change in family structure are largely independent. 5 Tables, 1 Figure, 1 Appendix, 41 References. Adapted from the source document. (Copyright 1996, Sociological Abstracts, Inc., all rights reserved.)
Bibliography Citation
Wu, Lawrence L. "Effects of Family Instability, Income, and Income Instability on the Risk of a Premarital Birth." American Sociological Review 61,3 (June 1996): 386-406.