Health and Risk Behaviors of Urban Adolescent Males Involved in Pregnancy

Abstract

A growing number of researchers have focused attention on the social characteristics and health-jeopardizing behaviors of teenage fathers over the past decade. The authors expand the scope of such studies by including a wider array of outcome variables, compared across four groups of males: (1) those who caused a pregnancy that was carried to term or (2) a pregnancy that resulted in abortion or miscarriage, (3) those uncertain as to whether they ever caused a pregnancy, and (4) those who never were involved in a pregnancy. Those never involved in a pregnancy were less likely to manifest various acting-out and health-compromising behaviors, whereas the three pregnancy-linked groups were characterized by their similarity to one another.