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Adolescent Pregnancy and Early Sexual Onset

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Advances in Clinical Child Psychology

Part of the book series: Advances in Clinical Child Psychology ((ACCP,volume 13))

Abstract

Adolescent childbearing, however common in the United States today, is not a single phenomenon but the end product of a series of behaviors, undertaken in a societal context in which postponement of parenthood until after school completion and marriage is seen as normative. Each behavior—sexual onset, contraception, conception, and childbearing— requires a decision (conscious or unconscious) that, in different cultural groups, is differently constrained by custom or sanctions. For moral, economic, and/or social reasons, all cultural groups appear to see a similar pattern of behavior as optimal: completed schooling, employment, marriage, and childbearing. However, the strength of that normative ordering differs with the perceived rewards of conforming to it and with the perceived penalties of departing from it.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Population Dynamics, Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health, 21205, Baltimore, Maryland, USA

    Laurie Schwab Zabin

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  1. Laurie Schwab Zabin
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia, USA

    Benjamin B. Lahey

  2. Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA

    Alan E. Kazdin

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© 1990 Plenum Press, New York

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Zabin, L.S. (1990). Adolescent Pregnancy and Early Sexual Onset. In: Lahey, B.B., Kazdin, A.E. (eds) Advances in Clinical Child Psychology. Advances in Clinical Child Psychology, vol 13. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-9835-6_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-9835-6_7

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