ABSTRACT
Proclaimed a “national scandal” and cited as an indication of “a failure of American society,” teen pregnancy has been at the forefront of national debates and policy legislation about single motherhood, welfare, and the decline of morality and family values in the United States.1 The phrase “teen pregnancy” is so engrained into U.S. political discourse and public sentiment that it may be surprising to note that this commonly used phrase has a relatively short history. Prior to the mid-1970s, the phrase was not used and the attention of the public and of policy makers, albeit scant, was focused upon the issue of unwed mothers of all ages. While we have always had “teen mothers” in society, we have not always had focused research, policy, and media attention on teen mothers. Indeed, adolescent pregnancy was not seen as a specific problem to study until the 1960s but soon
caught popular media attention with the now oft used phrase “Children having Children.”2 The phrase “teen pregnancy” has further become symbolically linked with the economic and moral character of U.S. society and the problems associated with unwed teen pregnancy are assumed by policy makers and the lay citizen to be commonly known.
