Although nonmarital births are on the rise for all women, they are
disproportionately high for adolescents, especially those who are poor
and African American. Scholars agree that adolescent childbearing
results in negative outcomes. This critique of the problem of adolescent
pregnancy from various theoretical paradigms argues that the
alternate-lifestyle paradigm is a rational explanatory model for the
analysis of adolescent pregnancy. That is, some female adolescents,
regardless of race, see childbearing as a rite of passage to adulthood.
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