Commitment to Social Fatherhood: Predicting Adolescent Males' Intentions to Live with Their Child and Partner

Abstract

This study employs Fishbein and Ajzens social psychological model to examine young males beliefs attitudes normative beliefs and intentions regarding hypothetical living arrangements in the event of a nonmarital pregnancy to a girl they had been dating for a year. On the basis of this model it was anticipated that males intentions would be a function of their personal attitudes and the perception of how they feel significant others would expect them to behave. Analyses are based on survey data from 325 high school males in a midwestern metropolitan city. Almost 48% of the respondents indicate that they would be at least quite likely to live with their child and partner. Whites and blacks have similar intentions. The attitudinal and subjective norm components of this model combine to explain 32% of the variance in behavioral intentions. The attitudinal component is a powerful predictor of behavioral intention for blacks and whites alike but the subjective norm component is a significant predictor of intention only for whites. (authors)