Racial and Ethnic Differences in the Effect of Family Instability on Adolescents’ Behavior

We use data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N=7,686) to determine whether racial and ethnic differences in socioeconomic stress and social protection explain group differences in the association between family structure instability and three outcomes for white, black, and Mexican-American adolescents: delinquent behavior, age at first sex, and age at first nonmarital birth. We find that the positive association between mothers’ union transitions and each outcome for white adolescents is attenuated by social protection. The association of instability with age at first sex and first nonmarital birth is weaker for black adolescents, but not for Mexican-American adolescents. The weaker association is explained by black adolescents’ more frequent exposure to socioeconomic stress in the context of union instability. Racial/Ethnic Differences in Family Instability 1 A growing body of research supports the instability hypothesis, which states that multiple changes in family structure affect children’s behavioral development as much as or more than the characteristics of the family systems they reside in at any given point (Cavanagh, 2008; Cavanagh et al., 2008; Fomby & Cherlin, 2007; Heard, 2007; Wu & Martinson, 1993). However, there has been little research to explain a provocative finding: instability appears to have a strong association with some aspects of behavioral development for white children, but not for black children. To address this discrepancy, we test two theories that have been posited to explain racial and ethnic differences in children’s adjustment to family change: social protection and socioeconomic stress (McLoyd et al., 2000). We use nationally representative data to compare the relative importance of these mechanisms for explaining differences in the association of family structure instability with three outcomes for white, black, and MexicanAmerican adolescents: self-reported delinquent behavior, age at nonmarital sexual initiation, and age at first nonmarital birth. Literature review Tests of the instability hypothesis have become increasingly salient as the prevalence of births within cohabiting unions has increased (Chandra et al., 2005) while cohabiting unions have remained relatively unstable union types compared to marriage (Manning et al., 2004). Additionally, as research has suggested, children born to single mothers who remain unmarried fare at least as well and perhaps better than children residing in stepfamilies (Cherlin & Furstenberg Jr., 1994); therefore, researchers have evaluated the consequences of federal policies to promote marriage among low-income single mothers (Graefe & Lichter, 2007). Studies of family structure instability have added to earlier research that used static measures of family structure by testing the theory that repeated disruptions to the family system, caused by either the addition or departure of a household member, may lead to behaviors with potentially deleterious long-term consequences. Although a full causal chain has not been identified, various explanations for why instability matters for children’s behavior have been Racial/Ethnic Differences in Family Instability 2 supported by empirical research. These include children’s repeated exposure to poor union quality in the context of dissolving or newly forming unions (Fomby & Osborne, 2008), compromised parent-child relationships in response to persistent instability (Cavanagh, 2008), and maternal stress following a family structure transition (Osborne & McLanahan, 2007). A subset of literature testing the instability hypothesis has identified significant differences between black and white children in the association of family structure transitions with some behavioral outcomes. In sum, this work indicates that family structure transitions, as measured by the entry into or exit from a household of a mother’s married or cohabiting partners, has deleterious consequences for white children, but not for black children. Using data from the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY79), Wu and Thomson (2001) found that family structure transitions were associated with a higher risk of first intercourse at an early age for white women, but not for black women. Wu and Martinson (1993, using the National Survey of Families and Households) and Wu (1996, using the NLSY79) found that the effect of family structure instability on nonmarital births was weaker for black than for white young women. Using the NLSY79 and the Children of the NLSY (CNLSY), Fomby and Cherlin (2007) reported that white children aged 5 to 14 who experienced more family structure transitions had more externalizing behavior problems; and for children 10 to 14, transitions were positively associated with self-reported delinquent behavior after controlling for attributes of the mother’s background. For black children, these associations were absent. To date, research on family structure instability has not reported differences in the effect of family structure instability on these outcomes for racial and ethnic groups other than white and black children; nor has research explicitly reported that there are not racial and ethnic differences in the effects of family structure instability on other outcomes or in other data sources. Two hypotheses suggested by research on children’s exposure to family conflict and divorce may explain why family instability has a stronger association with behavior for white adolescents than for black adolescents (see McLoyd et al., 2000 for a review). First, black adolescents, who Racial/Ethnic Differences in Family Instability 3 tend to reside in more economically stressful environments than white adolescents, may absorb the addition or departure of a household member as one more change in a context defined by turbulence (the socioeconomic stress hypothesis). Second, black adolescents may have greater average access than white adolescents to extended kin and other adult role models inside or outside of the parental household, and those adults may help the child to absorb the impact of family structure change (referred to as the protection hypothesis). To our knowledge, these hypotheses have not been tested together previously in an attempt to explain racial and ethnic differences in the effects of family structure change. Socioeconomic Stress Hypothesis The socioeconomic stress hypothesis asserts that factors related to persistent poverty and unemployment overwhelm the effect of changes in family structure on adolescents’ development. Racial and ethnic differences in exposure to these factors will explain observed racial and ethnic variation in the association of instability with adolescent outcomes. Evidence for this hypothesis comes from a variety of sources. In a meta-analysis of the effects of divorce on children in adulthood, Amato and Keith (1991) posited that many children of color experience more generally stressful environments that diminish the unique impact of a single event like a divorce. Additional evidence comes from a longitudinal study in which African-American children in married-parent families that eventually divorced had lower family incomes prior to divorce and were less likely to have increased externalizing behavior problems following divorce compared to European-American children (Shaw et al., 1999). The authors concluded that among the African-American families considered, but not among the European-American families, the risk of divorce or separation is tied to poverty and unemployment, conditions that potentially influence adolescents’ development at least as much as family structure instability itself. In a sample of middle school students, scholastic performance was lower among white students who had experienced a parental divorce since the second grade; among black students, scholastic performance was lower among those who had experienced a divorce prior Racial/Ethnic Differences in Family Instability 4 to kindergarten (Smith, 1997). The author concludes that white children’s response to divorce was related to exposure to conflict and the emotional trauma of separation, while black children’s response resulted from the economic disadvantage associated with residing in a single-parent family. Beyond individual and family-level indicators of socioeconomic stress and poverty, race/ethnic differences in socioeconomic context at the neighborhood level also may explain group differences in the association of family structure instability with adolescent risk behavior. In neighborhood contexts where nonmarital family organization and family structure instability are more pervasive, the dissolution and formation of unions within an adolescent’s household may be relatively less stressful to adolescents. Whereas those changes are more normative whether family instability is characterized locally by changes in cohabiting union status (Edin & Kefalas, 2006) or by divorce and remarriage. At the same time, adolescents residing in neighborhoods characterized by high levels of concentrated poverty and minority racial segregation are relatively more likely to engage in delinquency and early family formation (Browning, Leventhal, & Brooks-Gunn 2004; Baumer & South 2001; South & Baumer 2000, Billy, Brewster, & Grady 1994, Frank et al., 2007; Wilson 1987; Massey & Denton, 1994). Concentrated neighborhood poverty may influence adolescents’ risk-taking behavior through greater exposure to social disorganization and lower social cohesion (Billy, Brewster, & Grady 1994), peer attitudes that promote risk-taking behavior (Baumer & South, 2001; South & Baumer, 2000), and a perceived shortage of long-term economic prospects (MacLeod, 1995). Compositional differences between the families of black adolescents and white adolescents that are predictive of union disruption also may be indicative of socioeconomic strain. Among children in married unions, compositional factors include