Posted on February 11, 2010

Physiological distress in teenage mothers and pregnant teens is a common phenomenon. What is often believed however is the distress is a result of the pregnancy. New research suggests distress was present before the pregnancy even occurred. A recent Science Daily piece examines the trend.

“Psychological distress does not appear to be caused by teen childbearing, nor does it cause teen childbearing, except apparently among girls from poor households,” said Stefanie Mollborn, Ph.D., an assistant professor of sociology at the Institute of Behavioral Science of the University of Colorado at Boulder, in Science Daily.

The study relied on data from two large long-term U.S. surveys which followed thousands of teen girls and women. Participants responded to such items as how often they found things that did not usually bother them to be bothersome, how easily they could shake off feeling blue or whether they had trouble concentrating.

Within the study, only the combination of poverty and existing distress was a good predictor of teen pregnancy. Within previous studies, researchers found high levels of depression among teen mothers. Nationally however, representative studies had not examined if distress was present before the pregnancy and stresses of young motherhood.

“Psychologically distressed girls are at risk for teen childbearing and vice versa, even if the two things usually do not cause each other,” Mollborn said. “This could help educators and clinicians identify at-risk adolescents.”

Diane Merritt, M.D., director of Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, noted looking for symptoms of depression or distress should be part of normal health screening for all teenagers. “Talking to teenagers about their sexuality and responsible behavior is key,” she said.

Mollborn highlighted that high levels of depression have long-term negative consequences for both mothers and children. Higher levels of psychological distress in women who had teenage pregnancies continued well into adulthood.