African-American and White Adolescent Mothers: Can Early Intervention Programs Help? (Children of Poverty)

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This book examines the effectiveness of nurse home visits that have designed toensure the healthy growth and development of young children of poor, unmarried African American and white adolescent mothers' by enhancing the mothers social support networks. Now more than ever, adolescent pregnancy and out-of-wedlock births are among the social and economic conditions that have made it difficult for American families to sustain themselves. Of primary concern is whether teenage mothers can effectively meet the needs of their infants when they themselves are grappling with developmental issues inherent in adolescence.This study concludes that the results of nurse home visits for adolescent mothers are mixed, depending on racial background and treatment group. Nurse visits increased levels of anticipated support on the part of adolescent mothers and enhanced the level of interest that male partners had in the pregnancies. Adolescent mothers without nurse visits were more likely than those with nurse visits to have high levels of child care and chore support once their children were born. African American adolescents reported higher levels of support in general than did white mothers. This book discusses the implications of these findings for policy.