An important trend in addition to the decline in teen birth rates was the decline in second births to teenagers. At its peak in the early 1990s, for every one thousand women age fifteen to nineteen who had given birth to a child, 220 gave birth to a second child while still a teenager. This trend dropped dramatically to about 173 second births per one thousand by 2000.
Between 1990 and 2002 the rate of first births increased for all women over age thirty. The increase was most dramatic in the thirty to thirty-four age group, which rose from a rate of 21.2 per one thousand births in 1990 to 26.6 per one thousand births by 2002. Asian-American women had the most stable first birth rate during the period, with an overall decline of just three-tenths of a point between 1990 and 2002.
Extending the Childbearing Years
Before the 1960s, when larger families were more common, it was not unusual for a woman to continue having babies well into her thirties or even her forties. However, as family size decreased, it became more common to have the typical two or three children during the first years of marriage when the woman was generally in her twenties. While most women still gave birth while in their twenties, a significant proportion began to wait until their thirties to have their first child. In the 1950s, women bearing children in their thirties were generally having their third or fourth child. Half a century later, many women who gave birth in their thirties were typically having their first or second child.
Historically, ages fifteen to forty-four were considered the childbearing years for record-keeping purposes. But women in the 1990s began to push that age forward, often with the help of new technological advances in reproductive medicine. The Bureau of Vital Statistics reported that between 1990 and 2002 the birth rate for women age forty to forty-four increased 51%, from 5.5 to 8.3 births per one thousand women. For women in the forty-five to forty-nine age group, the rate more than doubled from 0.2 to 0.5. Data for women past the age of fifty has been limited, but births have extended into that age group.
Nonmarital Childbearing
Prior to the 1970s the typical pregnant, unmarried woman either got married or gave the child up for adoption. Some women had abortions. However it was handled, the pregnancy was often cloaked in secrecy. An
FIGURE 2.1
unmarried pregnant woman often left her family's home and community during the pregnancy to stay with a relative or entered a home for unwed mothers; in each case, her family made some excuse for her absence. The infant was given up for adoption and never openly discussed. Few women risked the social stigma of raising a child alone, at least without concocting a story of a husband who abandoned the woman or met an untimely death.
REUNITING ADOPTEES WITH THEIR PARENTS. Although young unmarried women who gave up their babies for adoption often suffered great guilt and wondered about the quality of the child's life, they never expected to meet that child in the future. Adoption records were sealed and the mothers expected to remain forever anonymous. In an unexpected twist, as these adopted children married and began their own families, many wanted to know their personal heritage. In some cases they wanted to know family medical history, including genetic conditions that might affect the adopted person's health or that of his or her own biological children. Other adoptees wanted to understand the circumstances that resulted in their adoption or to know general family information and family traits.
In January 2004 the American Adoption Information Clearinghouse reported that the percentage of adults searching for their birth parents continued to increase. The organization estimated that half of all adopted persons searched for their birth parents at some time in their lives. In addition, a growing number of birth parents searched for their adult children who were placed for adoption many years earlier. New legislation in some states allowed greater access to adoption information, and computer and Internet technology expanded and speeded the search options. A variety of organizations emerged to assist with searches and serve as go-betweens in making contact. While many birth parents and natural children were pleased to be reunited, the new relationships added one more complexity to the profile of the American family.
TO MARRY OR NOT TO MARRY. According to the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, the period 1960–64 was the peak for pregnant women choosing marriage. During that time, 60% of women who were unmarried at the time of conception married before the births of their babies. Immediately prior to and immediately following those years, about 54% of pregnant women wed before giving birth. That rate had dropped significantly by the late 1970s. Between 1975 and 1979, just 32% of unmarried, pregnant women chose marriage. Societal and family pressures on unexpectedly expectant couples to marry quickly had diminished, and other factors may have played a role in the drop as well—including women's increased earning power and the number of couples who chose to cohabit rather than marry.
A report from the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics tracked birthrates for children born to unmarried American women since 1980. Between that year and 2002 the percentage of births to unmarried mothers nearly doubled, from 18.4% to 34%. Births to unmarried women in their twenties generally increased at a steady rate during this period. The greatest rise in non-marital births was a thirty-five percentage point increase in the eighteen to nineteen age group. The year 1994 marked the high point for births to unmarried women age thirty and over. After decreasing by 1–1.5 percentage points by 1999 and 2000, the birth rate for the over-thirty group rose slightly in 2001 and 2002.
According to data published by the U.S. Census Bureau, between June 2001 and June 2002 1.3 million unmarried women gave birth. They represented 33% of all births during that twelve-month period. The highest proportions of out-of-wedlock births were to young women age fifteen to nineteen (89%), African-American women (65%), and women who had not graduated from high school (63%). (See Figure 2.2.)
The birth rate among women living with an unmarried partner (eighty-seven per one thousand women) was almost the same as for women living with a husband (eighty-six per one thousand). The birth rate for unmarried women not living with a partner (thirty-six per one thousand) was less than half of that for cohabiting women. (See Table 2.1.)
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