Thesis (Ph. D.)--University OF MICHIGAN, 1976.

Thesis (M.S.W.)--Smith College School for Social Work, Northampton, Mass., 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 62-64).

DISSERTATION (PH.D.)--THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN, 1976.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Notre Dame, 2007. / Thesis directed by John G. Borkowski for the Department of Psychology. "April 2007." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 43-51).

M.A. / This study was conducted at Mankweng District in Limpopo Province initially known as Northern Province. The study was undertaken to explore the nature of the resources for school going teenage mothers and to address the gap in identifying that. The study used a quantitative research design, with fourty respondents. Respondents were 10 school going teenage mothers; 10 parents of school going teenage mothers, 10 social workers and 10 teachers. A structured questionnaire was used to obtain information on socio-economic factors, contraceptive knowledge, sex education, the utilization of human and non human resources and services offered by different practitioners. The results confirmed that various practitioners did not work as a system in addressing the problem of teenage mothers. It also presented focus on lack of communication between parents and teenagers regarding sexuality education. Most of the teenage mothers were not utilizing the existing non human resources. Both of these conclusions pose critical challenges for health promoters. / Dr. E. Oliphant Prof. W.A. Mitchell

The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of teenage motherhood on the school readiness, literacy skills, and parental involvement of children participating in the Home Instruction for Parents of Preschool Youngsters (HIPPY) early intervention program, as well as make recommendations for optimal outcomes. Study children were participants in HIPPY at five diverse, urban school districts. Using a mixed method design, this study examined the results of quantitative measures of children's school readiness, literacy skills, and parent involvement along with qualitative data collected through mothers' responses to two, open-ended questions related to their satisfaction with HIPPY. According to results of independent samples t-test, mean scores on school readiness and parent involvement measures were not statistically significantly different for the children of teenage mothers and the children of traditional age mothers. However, there were moderate effect sizes for parent involvement and physical development indicating some practical significance. Chi-square results of literacy skills indicated that the children of teenage mothers were almost twice as likely [c2 (1, N = 36) = 4.21, p < .05] to have literacy skills that were "not on grade level" according to scores on the TPRI/Tejas. Descriptive discriminant analysis (DDA) indicated that the multivariate relationship of the four parent involvement variables statistically significantly contributed to whether children born to teenage mothers had literacy skills on grade-level, but it was not significant for the children of traditional-age mothers. DDA analysis conducted on the school readiness variables did not yield any significant results. In addition, odds ratios conducted between literacy level and each of the parent involvement and school readiness variables indicated an increased probability of a child's literacy skills being on grade level when scores were high, but these increases were not statistically significant. While there were differences in literacy skills, teen mothers indicated, through their responses to two, open-ended questions, their desire to for more support for their children in this area.

Adolescent pregnancy has been of longstanding societal concern primarily because of the inability of most young mothers to provide adequately for their infants. Depression often results in disengagement from mother-child interaction. Adolescent mothers identified as depressed are at increased risk of future psychopathology, with additional deleterious effects on their infants&rsquo / lives. The purpose of this study was to explore adolescent mothers&rsquo / experiences of motherhood and memories of feeling depressed during or after the birth of their babies. The first aim was to explore the young women&rsquo / s experiences of mothering, by focusing upon the practice of being a mother. The second aim was to explore the young women&rsquo / s experiences of depression, by focusing on their physical behaviour and emotional experiences. The third aim was to explore their perceptions of the causes of their depression. The rationale for this study was that these issues will further enhance the body of knowledge available to practitioners working with adolescent mothers. It will also provide a source of insights and hypotheses for preventive intervention research. The study was located within a feminist standpoint framework that begins from the perspective of women with the aim to explore women&rsquo / s accounts of their experiences in relation to depression as an important source of knowledge. A qualitative research design and methodology was employed in the region of the Western Cape. Eight adolescent mothers between the ages of 16 and 19 were recruited and interviewed. The interviews were semi-structured and consisted out of open-ended questions. Interviews were recorded, transcribed verbatim and thematic analysis of data was carried out. The findings of this research yielded some interesting areas for future research and implications for treatment and intervention with first-time adolescent mothers. The adolescent mothers in this study experienced similar depressive symptoms to adult mothers in previous research. All the participants revealed that they feared their parents&rsquo / disappointment in them for being pregnant. This factor contributed to their depression, because they received very little (if any) support from their parents or the father of their baby. The participants discussed that their pregnancy or giving birth was linked to various aspects of themselves that they had lost as an adolescent. Before they received counselling, none of the participants understood why they experienced depressive symptoms or what was happening to them at the time after their pregnancies.

<p>Teenage pregnancy and motherhood is a challenging phenomenon worldwide. The goal of this study was to explore and describe the perceptions and experiencesof a sample of teenage girls about pregnancy, birth and motherhood. The objectives of the research were to engage voluntary participants in autobiographical &quot / life stories&quot / and semi structured interviews relating to the phenomenon being studied / to analyze the qualitative information and do a literature control of the findings and compare and verify and make appropriate conclusions and recommendations.</p>

The purpose of this study is to examine the problems that pregnant teenagers encounter at school and at home while they are trying to complete their high school education. Data were collected by in-depth interviews. Twenty pregnant adolescents, who were between the ages of 15 through 18, and were participants in a special teen pregnancy program were interviewed. The major findings in this study included the respondents': 1) unstable family life histories, 2) denial that they were pregnant, 3) need for self-identity as an adult, 4) conflict with parents and 5) motivation to complete their high school education. This study points to the need for more research on the problems that pregnant adolescents encounter in their everyday lives.

This study aimed to investigate teenage mothers’ experiences of motherhood and their internal representations of their infants and the relationship between them. In addition, this study aimed to investigate whether there was a connection between teenage mothers’ experiences of parenting and their internal representations of their infants and the relationship between them. Through the use of semi-structured interviews, adapted from the Parent Development Interview and the Working Model of the Child Interview, four teenage mothers from Alexandra were interviewed. The data collected from these interviews was analysed using narrative analysis through the hermeneutic lens of psychoanalytic attachment theory. From the analysis, this study found that teenage mother’s experiences of motherhood were marked by challenge. The two main challenges faced by these young mothers were the tension they experienced between their identities as teenagers and their identities as mothers, and their struggle to provide for their infants and feel like good enough mothers. In addition, this study found that teenage mother’s internal representations of their infants included a representation of both the good baby and the bad baby, but, with the exception of one mother, their representations tended to remain split and the mothers seemed defended against their representations of the bad baby. In terms of their representations of the relationship between them, this study found that these teenage mothers’ representations of their relationship with their infants was lacking. These representations either consisted of a superficial representation of a good relationship between mother and infant, or no relationship at all. Finally, this study found that teenage mother’s experiences of motherhood and their internal representations of their infants and the relationship between them were connected. A number of factors that were found to influence both their experiences and their internal representations include their own mental states, their memoires of their own childhood and their representations of their caregivers, as well as the levels of social support they received. The study therefore concluded that teenage mothers’ experiences of motherhood and their internal representations of their infants and the relationship between them were connected, however further research is required to establish the causal relationship between these factors.