Young Families in the Community: An Exploratory Analysis of Child Welfare Contact Among Young Mothers and their Children

Abstract

The dominant frame in the literature regarding pregnancy and parenting among women with a history of child welfare contact is that of teen pregnancy as social crisis. This project reconsiders the issue of pregnancy and parenting among young women in the community and their contact with child welfare, relying instead on the concept of Reproductive Justice as an analytic frame. Rather than situating these young mothers as a cause of social inequality and of poor outcomes for their children, Reproductive Justice draws attention to social conditions and aligns our inquiries and solutions with the alleviation of stigma and identification and provision of needed supports. Using vital statistics matched administrative data from the Department of Child and Family Services in Cuyahoga County, I ask the following questions: Of young women in the community who give birth in their teen years, what is the extent of their contact with the child welfare system, throughout the mothers’ history, and then for their children after birth? Are there differences in allegations of maltreatment, results of investigations, and/or reasons for removal from home for young women who come into contact with child protective services around the time of their pregnancies and births versus those who have prior contact? Is pregnancy in the teen years a risk factor for coming into contact with the child welfare system? For these young women and children who have contact with the child welfare system, what are the points of contact? What is the “foster care birth rate” when accounting only for young women actually in care at the time of birth, and how does this compare to the rate of birth in the community? How does mothers’ contact with the child welfare system relate to contact for their children? Are there differences along any of these domains according to the assigned race of the mother? In addition to specific rates of contact and details of involvement for mothers and their children in the times before, during and after pregnancy, I find that: DCFS involvement among these young women and their children was a common occurrence. However, the majority of mothers in this sample (85.8%) had no substantiated record of childhood abuse, despite high levels of surveillance (reports of maltreatment and involvement with DCFS). Pregnancy and childbirth were times of heightened sensitivity for reports and previous contact with DCFS seemed to amplify this sensitivity, though it seems that DCFS is doing some work to filter out spurious claims. Of young mothers in the community, only a small fraction of mothers (14.3%) had a record of one or more out-of-home placements, and births to young women in foster care were an extremely small percentage (1%) of births to young women in the community. When accounting only for births to young women in foster care at the time of conception and birth, and accounting for minority overrepresentation, the rate of birth was less than (.78 times) the rate of birth to young women in the community. What contact children had was, to some extent, a function of mothers’ contact and there were observable differences for mothers by identified “race” in nearly every domain. The problem of framing “teen pregnancy” as social and personal crisis, and implications for social work scholarship and practice, are discussed.