Trajectories of Unintended Fertility

Karen B. Guzzo, Bowling Green State University
S. Philip Morgan, Duke University
Sowmya Rajan, Duke University

This study expands recent research on early unintended childbearing and its consequences for the subsequent fertility of young women. Women who have an unintended birth face an increased risk of a subsequent unintended birth, suggesting a trajectory of unintendedness. We use discrete-time event history models to analyze four waves of panel data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health). We plan to study intendedness of births by parity, controlling on sociodemographic characteristics, family background, religiosity, personality traits, and mental and physical health using multinomial logistic regression models. Our preliminary results indicate support for our hypothesis of a trajectory of unintendedness of fertility that is concentrated among a subset of women.