Disentangling Perceived Norms: Predictors of Unintended Pregnancy During the Transition to Adulthood

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12403
• Date: 01 August 2017
• Author: Ellen L. Compernolle
• Published date: 01 August 2017

E L. C University of Michigan

Disentangling Perceived Norms: Predictors

of Unintended Pregnancy During the Transition

to Adulthood

Using data from the Relationship Dynamics and

Social Life Study, this study examines the role

of perceived norms in predicting unintended

pregnancy among young women aged 18 to 22

years. First, it compares the relative inuence

of the content (injunctive [approval] versus

descriptive [prevalence]) and referent (parents

versus friends) of fertility-related norms. Sec-

ond, in identifying entrance into motherhood as

an important life course event, particularly dur-

ing the transition to adulthood, it explores how

these inuences vary by parity. Third, it tests

two potential mechanisms: conformity via inter-

nalization and supercial conformity. Findings

support injunctive norms: Nonmothers’ risk of

unintended pregnancy is largely inuenced by

friends’ approval, whereas parents’ approval

best predicts that of young mothers’. The effects

are independent of respondents’ own attitudes,

suggesting supercial conformity. The study

sheds light on how young women’s perceptions

of what is “normal” among important oth-

ers inuence a consequential early-life event:

becoming a parent.

Unintended pregnancy—those that are mis-

timed or unwanted (Santelli et al., 2003)—in

Department of Sociology, Universityof Michigan,

Literature Sciences and the Arts Building, Room 3001,

500 S. State Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1382

(ecomper@umich.edu).

Key Words: life course, pregnancy, social psychology.

the United States remains a national health

concern. Pregnancy rates among teenagers and

young women increased from the early 1970s

to the early 1990s by roughly 21% and 17%,

respectively (Kost & Henshaw, 2010). Although

the teen and overall birthrate has since declined

(Ventura, Hamilton, & Matthews, 2014), the

U.S. teenage pregnancy rate remains among

the highest of all industrialized nations (Singh

& Darroch, 2000), with recent estimates of

22.3 live births per 1,000 females aged 15 to

19 years (Hamilton, Martin, Osterman, Curtin,

& Mathews, 2016). Global comparisons nd

that North America is the only region in which

overall and unintended pregnancy rates havenot

declined since 1995 (Singh, Sedgh, & Hussain,

2010). Unintended pregnancy rates vary largely

by sociodemographic characteristics, with rates

above average for women who are unmarried,

have low incomes, are racial or ethnic minori-

ties, and have not completed high school. The

highest rates of unintended pregnancy in the

United States are for women aged 18 to 24 years

(Finer & Zolna, 2014).

Although researchers agree that most of

the consequences of unintended pregnancy

are a result of selection (e.g., Ashcraft,

Fernández-Val, & Lang, 2013; Furstenberg,

2003; Kost & Lindberg, 2015), the eventis asso-

ciated with an array of serious consequences

for both mothers and children (Gipson, Koenig,

& Hindin, 2008). Women who experience an

unintended pregnancy are at greater risk of

physical abuse and violence than women whose

1076 Journal of Marriage and Family 79 (August 2017): 1076–1095

DOI:10.1111/jomf.12403

Perceived Norms and Unintended Young Pregnancy 1077

pregnancies are reported as intended (Gazmarar-

ian et al., 1995; Lau, 2005). They also tend to

receive less preconception and delayed prenatal

care (Brown & Eisenberg, 1995), experience

higher rates of postpartum depression (Lau &

Keung, 2007), and be at greater risk of preterm

delivery and low birth weights (Eggleston, Tsui,

& Kotelchuck, 2001). In addition, children

born from an unintended pregnancy often have

poorer physical and mental health (Crissey,

2006), lower cognitive test scores (Baydar,

1995), and higher levels of delinquency during

adolescence (Hay & Evans, 2006) than those

born from an intended pregnancy.

Researchers highlight the importance of

perceived norms in explaining behaviors,

including those related to fertility (Liefbroer

& Billari, 2010; Mollborn, 2007, 2010; Moll-

born, Domingue, & Boardman, 2014). Studies

often situate norms into the theory of planned

behavior framework proposed by Fishbein and

Ajzen (2011; Ajzen, 1991). The framework

posits that perceived norms—that is, an individ-

ual’s perceptions of important others’ attitudes

(injunctive norms) and behaviors (descriptive

norms)—associated with a behavior along

with an individual’s attitudes toward and per-

ceived control over the behavior act together to

inuence behavioral intentions, which in turn

determine the probability of following through

with the behavior. Despite its focus on intended

behaviors, the theory of planned behavior lends

well to the study of unintended young preg-

nancy for two reasons. One, young adulthood

is characterized by its highly uncertain nature

and frequency of transitions. Consideration of

young women’s dynamic and often changing

social environment is key to understanding their

fertility. Two, as recent research emphasizes the

complexity of intentions and reasoned action

in the heat of the moment (e.g., Barber, 2011;

Gibbons, Gerard, & McCoy, 1995), these same

social factors are likely to help explain the high

rate of young women’s pregnancies that are

unintended as well.

Two salient social actors on whom young

adults draw normative ideas to inform their deci-

sions when faced with these uncertainties are

parents and friends (Udry, 1993). Regarding

fertility, evidence suggests that parents’ prefer-

ences and behaviors regarding family formation

inuence their children’s related attitudes and

behaviors (e.g., Barber, 2001; Steenhof & Lief-

broer, 2008). However, parental inuences tend

to weaken as children age into adulthood as a

result of new socialization forces, notably peer

networks. Teenagers tend to conform to the fam-

ily formation behaviors of their friends by learn-

ing about contraceptives and how to obtain them

(Mollborn et al., 2014; Montgomery & Cas-

terline, 1996)—effects likely to persist into the

late teens and early 20s—while remaining inu-

enced by deeply ingrained parental beliefs.

Parents and friends are predicted to inuence

young women’s pregnancy-related attitudes

and behaviors, although the contents, sources,

and transmission mechanisms of perceived

norms that best predict unintended pregnancy

remain unclear. Specically, little is known

about whether these norms operate through

young women’s own pregnancy attitudes (con-

formity via internalization) or independent of

them (supercial conformity) or, importantly,

whether young motherhood itself alters these

social inuences.

This study examines how perceived norms

regarding pregnancy-related attitudes and

behaviors inuence nonmarital unintended

pregnancy among young women aged 18 to

22 years during the transition to adulthood. It

uses highly detailed data from the Relationship

Dynamics and Social Life study (collected

2008–2012 in Genesee County, MI; http://

www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/DSDR/studies/

34626). The sample surveys women found to

have the highest risk of unintended pregnancy

in the United States—those unmarried and aged

in their late teens or early 20s—and is represen-

tative of Michigan, a state with fertility patterns

that match the median in the United States as a

whole. The data are uniquely designed for this

investigation because women reported weekly

on their pregnancy status and intentions and

reported every 3 months on their perceptions

of friends’ and parents’ pregnancy-related

attitudes and behaviors as well as their own

attitudes toward the same behaviors. The study

makes three important contributions to the liter-

ature. First, it compares for predictive power the

content (injunctive [approval] versus descrip-

tive [prevalence]) and the referents (parents

versus friends) of perceived norms (Question

1). Second, it analyzes how these effects vary

by parity, shedding light on how salient social

inuences differ based on a young woman’s

motherhood status (Question 2). Third, by

including respondents’ own pregnancy-related

attitudes in predictive models, it accounts