Teen Mothers Parenting their Own Teen Offspring

Abstract

This study investigated whether parenting support moderated relations between age of mother at childbirth and parental responsiveness and monitoring. The sample included 212 African American families living in urban public housing; Offspring were entering adolescence when data were collected. Parenting support was measured by assessing the perceived assistance mothers received with parenting tasks. Child, maternal, and observer reports of maternal responsiveness and child and maternal reports of monitoring were used to measure parenting behaviors. Multigroup structural equation modeling was employed to examine the hypotheses. Results indicated that parenting support moderated the association between age of mother at childbirth and monitoring. Specifically, the younger a mother is when she has her child, the less she monitors her child, but only if she perceives that she is receiving little parenting support. Among mothers who reported higher levels of parenting support, no relationship existed between age of mother and monitoring behaviors.