The purpose of this dissertation is to look at the problem of teen pregnancy and parenting on a national, state and local level. When dealing with the local level, the study will deal with the Adolescent Parenting Program (APP), Cambridge, Massachusetts. The first purpose of the study was to look at the research and literature on the topic of teen pregnancy and parenting to better understand the extent, magnitude, and issues surrounding this problem. The goal of the study was to contact participants of APP at Cambridge Rindge and Latin. The study utilized an author developed questionnaire and one-to-one interviews to gather research on the APP. With the results of the questionnaires and the interviews, many factors were found to have impacted on these pregnant and parenting teens, including family constellation, marital status of the parents of the respondents, marital status of the respondents, age dating was initiated, age sex was initiated, fear of sexually transmitted diseases, methods of birth control, age at birth of first child, planned/unplanned pregnancy, completing high school, employment, and relationship with baby's father. The first purpose of the study was to look at the problem of pregnant and parenting teens at a national, state, and local level. Research substantiated the need to help pregnant and parenting teens and this confirmed the need for the APP in Cambridge. The second and most important part of the study was to determine whether or not the APP was effective. The questionnaires and interviews confirmed this. The third purpose of the study was to determine whether Cambridge needed to do more in the area of teen pregnancy and parenting. There are various area that need improvement, but finances are a major issue. The fourth purpose of the study was to determine whether the APP and the First Steps Day Care could be replicated in other communities. There has been a great deal of interest demonstrated in these two programs, but there must be a commitment of not only money, but also of people to make the programs work.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UMASS/oai:scholarworks.umass.edu:dissertations-9015 |
| Date | 01 January 1994 |
| Creators | Farinato, Eleanor Arcanjo |
| Publisher | ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst |
| Source Sets | University of Massachusetts, Amherst |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Source | Doctoral Dissertations Available from Proquest |
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