Doctoral Dissertation Research: Non-Marital Fertility among Mexican Origin Women: Exploring the Role of Social Context

非婚生育率的上升和持续存在的种族/族裔差异是过去几十年来家庭中最重要的变化之一，引起了政治和学术领域的关注。 该项目建议研究非婚生育的种族/民族差异以及地理社会背景在这种关系中所起的作用，特别注意墨西哥裔妇女的非婚生育率高得惊人，这是人口中一个庞大且迅速增长的部分。 从理论基础上的黑白差异，这个项目将着眼于结构和经济因素，规范性的信念，和种族/民族隔离在宏观层面上发挥的作用，在维持群体差异在非婚生育。此外，它将探讨墨西哥裔美国人中更家庭化的文化是否能保护他们免受邻里劣势的有害影响。 1995年波的全国家庭成长调查（NSFG）和1995年NSFG上下文数据文件将被用于多层次的研究，以探讨是否理论的家庭形成，发展的基础上，黑人和白人的差异，举行时，墨西哥裔美国人被纳入分析。重要的是，这项研究将区分本土和外国出生的墨西哥裔美国人，以便更充分地探讨这个问题，并让我们深入了解这个人口在美国的表现如何。这项研究将有助于社会科学和政策研究人员填补了一个重要的差距，在家庭文献中扩展研究种族/民族差异的非婚生育，包括墨西哥裔美国人。这反过来又将有助于完善理论，而理论的基础主要是家庭形成过程中的黑人和白人差异。

The rise in non-marital fertility rates, and the persistent race/ethnic differential, is one of the most important changes in the family over the last several decades, raising concern in the political and academic arenas. This project proposes to look at race/ethnic differences in non-marital fertility and at the role that geo-social context plays in this relationship, paying particular attention to the surprisingly high levels of non-marital fertility among Mexican Origin women, a large and rapidly growing segment of the population. Drawing from theory based on black-white differences, this project will look at the role that structural and economic factors, normative beliefs, and race/ethnic segregation at the macro level play in maintaining group differences in non-marital fertility. Additionally, it will explore whether a more familistic culture among Mexican Americans protects them from the deleterious effects of neighborhood disadvantage. The 1995 wave of the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) and the 1995 NSFG contextual data file will be used in a multi-level study to explore whether theories of family formation, developed on the basis of black-white differences, hold when Mexican Americans are included in the analysis. Importantly, this research will distinguish between the native and foreign born Mexican American populations in order to more fully explore this question as well as give us insight into how well this population is doing within the context of the United States. This research will contribute to social science and policy researchers by filling an important gap in the family literature by extending research on race/ethnic differences in non-marital fertility by including Mexican Americans. This, in turn, will contribute to the refinement of theory, which is largely based on black-white differences in family formation processes.