Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Rudolph, Jennifer Leigh

Titel

Pathways of well -being: Adolescent girls and their sexual and pregnancy experiences

Ort / Verlag

ProQuest Dissertations Publishing

Erscheinungsjahr

2003

Link zum Volltext

• ProQuest

Quelle

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses A&I

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• In the last few decades, Americans reacted with concern to an increase in the rates of adolescent sex, pregnancy, birth, and abortion. In part, the concern is that having sex, becoming pregnant, becoming a mother, and having an abortion have negative social psychological consequences for young, immature adolescent girls. However, past research has not adequately considered the effect of adolescent sexuality on social psychological well-being. Thus, I compared the social psychological well-being of adolescent girls who have experienced different sexual and pregnancy trajectories. Specifically, I examined girls who have remained virgins, girls who have initiated sexual intercourse, girls who have been sexually active over a longer period of time, and girls who have become pregnant. Further, although numbers were relatively small, I compared girls who were continuing their pregnancy versus having an abortion. I measured social psychological well-being via self-esteem and depressive symptoms. Using ideas developed from the life-course perspective, I took into account the influence of normative timing and controlled for the intermediate, proximate, and individual level context. Data were drawn from the first two waves of the full, restricted use National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health). Results indicated a girl's level of sexual and pregnancy experience had little effect on her self-esteem but was crucial for her level of depressive symptoms. Overall, initiating sex negatively impacted depressive symptoms. Beyond initiation of sex, girls who experienced a pregnancy sometimes had an elevated risk for increased depressive symptoms. Under certain conditions the relationship between sexual status and depressive symptoms was moderated by a girl's age, by a girl's age within racial/ethnic sub-groups, and by prior levels of depressive symptoms. Specifically, younger girls initiating sex were more likely to experience low self-esteem. However, this age effect only occurs for White girls. Young African-American girls initiating sex were not at greater risk than older African-American girls. Also, among African-Americans, younger girls experiencing both the transition to first sex and pregnancy within a year were at lower risk of increased depressive symptoms as compared to older African-American girls making the same double transition. Finally, girls with higher prior levels of depressive symptoms had lower risk of increased depressive symptoms upon making a sexual transition (whether that transition was to first sex or was the continuation of sex with a pregnancy).