Objective: Despite the recent decrease in teen pregnancies, adolescent parenting is still an issue of public health and societal concern. Research on adolescent mothers and outcomes for their children are well documented. Recently, more attention has been placed on adolescent fathers. There is limited research on young African-American and even less on Latino fathers. This study explored early fatherhood from the minority perspective. Methods: Individual ethnographic interviews, focus groups and written surveys were utilized amongst 96(64 African-American and 32 Latino)adolescent and young adult fathers. Results: The fathers and their respective parents became parents at the same age(mean age=19).Perceived quality of relationship with their parents was associated with the desire to have a baby (p=.001). More AAs reported cessation of education than LAs (p=.044). Conclusions: Social support has been shown to ameliorate some of the negative consequences of early pregnancy. Further research is needed to explore social support and its effect on minority adolescent parenting from the asset versus the deficit based model.
Learning Objectives: To understand the african-American and Latino perspective on early fatherhood and potentially create programs that can improve outcomes for adolescent and young adult families.
Keywords: Adolescent Health, Child and Adolescent Mental Health
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
Organization/institution whose products or services will be discussed: None
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.