Talk:Teenage pregnancy/Archive 3

This is an archive of past discussions about Teenage pregnancy. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

RFC on including or excluding Mary, Mother of Jesus

Closing per request. Consensus was opposed to including Mary in the article as an example of a teenage mother. Opposition was based on a number of grounds-- perhaps the most compelling argument was that because the social ideas and attitudes related to teenage pregnancy are contemporary, few of which are particularly relevant in the case of Mary. Opposition based on claims that Jesus and/or Mary were fictional are not particularly relevant here and were discounted. The authenticity of people or events are not the subject of this RfC. While there's no doubt that the birth of Jesus is a famous and sacred event, its fame in the context of teenage pregnancy has not been sufficiently demonstrated. I, JethroBT ^{drop me a line} 22:20, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Teenage pregnancy#History previously named Mary, Mother of Jesus as an example of a teenage mother. Scholars believe that she was probably about 13 when when she gave birth to Jesus. It has been opposed because "it is difficult to establish that Jesus actually existed (our article citing Christians who believe in his existence not withstanding)". Should this article mention Mary, Mother of Jesus? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:56, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

Original text and source

(This is the original text and source, but please remember that the question is whether this article should mention Mary, Mother of Jesus at all, not whether it should be done in exactly this way.)

Perhaps the most famous teenage pregnancy in history was Mary, Mother of Jesus. She is generally believed to have been 13 years old when she gave birth to Jesus.^[1] Other sources place her age as high as 15 years.^{[citation needed]}

^ Hazleton, Lesley (2005). Mary: A Flesh-and-Blood Biography of the Virgin Mother. Bloomsbury USA. pp. 20–25. ISBN 1-58234-475-2.

Discussion

I support inclusion. IMO, a neutral article will mention the most famous teenage birth in history, in addition to a handful of royal births and modern celebrities. This birth is commonly listed among famous pregnancies (e.g., here). The lead of Jesus says that "Virtually all modern scholars of antiquity agree that a historical Jesus existed" and NPOV means going with whatever the large mass of scholars say, not going with only what scholars who meet some sort of religious test say.
I'd also support the addition of more and/or better sources. As noted in early discussions at the top of this page, no one has found any reliable sources that place Mary's age higher than 16, and that 13 is the most common age given (because, as explained at length in the cited source, that was the typical age for a first birth in the culture, and modern scholars tend to assume that Mary was typical). WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:56, 2 December 2013 (UTC)

From the review of the book on Amazon.com, "This unusual biography blends imagination and fact in an exquisitely told tale about the most reveled and admired woman of Christianity. Hazleton has been criticized for blurring the lines between research and fiction. (It's true--she does.) Nonetheless, she weaves an outstanding interpretation of this Palestinian girl, who probably went by the name of Maryam and gave birth to "the son of God" at the age of 13." Perhaps there is a better source, say from a biblical scholar? The author claims Mary was an unwed, pregnant teenager, but the rabbi who taught our Greek class told us that the Jewish custom of what we would call a betrothel was a marriage not yet consumated. She may be another Dan Brown. 207.41.178.122 (talk) 21:29, 7 December 2013 (UTC)

Support inclusion obviously, as "the most famous teenage birth in history". The objection noted above is a ridiculous one, considering that most modern scholars of antiquity agree that Jesus existed. This agreement has nothing to do with faith commitments. It should also be pointed out that this has nothing to do with the virgin- or otherwise nature of the birth. St Anselm (talk) 00:33, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
Support inclusion and move to strike an appeal to Christ myth theory as WP:FRINGE. Elizium23 (talk) 00:57, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose. Whatever evidence there may be about the existence of Jesus does not extend to historical evidence about the details of his birth or his parentage. The lead of Jesus is irrelevant, as we do not use Wikipedia to source itself. Further, the purpose of such an addition is quite dubious. Is it to somehow cast legitimacy on teenage birth? There's no particular reason to do that: teenage birth is quite common today, and I suspect even more common around 0 BC. The very source WhatamIdoing cites indicates that the age is assumed, rather than documented, precisely because 13 was the typical age for first birth in that culture. As for WP:FRINGE, it doesn't apply. It would if I were asking that we make some statement about Christ's historicity: I'm not.—Kww(talk) 01:02, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

While true historical evidence is certainly lacking, there is a vast body of modern and traditional scholarship that agrees Mary was in her teenage years, and this cannot be ignored or dismissed as unreliable. Elizium23 (talk) 01:46, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

It's a question of weight. If it added something of unquestionable value to the article, then it might be reasonable to include it along with some suitable statement about the lack of historical evidence. Since it doesn't add anything that would help the reader understand the topic of teenage pregnancy, the doubts as to its accuracy make it unsuitable for inclusion.—Kww(talk) 03:31, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

But who exactly is doubting its accuracy? St Anselm (talk) 04:10, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Let's see: the source that WhatAmIDoing is using won't commit to an age. Our own article on Mary makes no claim that there is a consensus among historians that Jesus was actually the son of a woman named "Mary", much less that they have any solid evidence as to what age she might have been when she gave birth. If the assumption of 13 is being made because it was "typical" for the time, that both undermines any claim that it is a fact and any significance to the age. If one says "Mary probably gave birth at the age of 13 because that was typical for mothers at the time", that is also saying "There is nothing particularly significant about this birth having taken place at the age of 13." And, although I'm aware people have been banned for pointing it out repetitively, I will again point out that while there is a consensus among Christians and Muslims that Jesus existed, that doesn't mean much.—Kww(talk) 05:51, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

With respect to the last point, people have probably been banned because the statement is deceptive - there is a consensus among historians that Jesus existed. St Anselm (talk) 07:42, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

The last point is a bit of a tangent, and should probably be taken elsewhere. I do, however, anxiously await your list of non-Christian, non-Muslim historians that attest to the historicity of Jesus.—Kww(talk) 13:48, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Both your assertion that Jesus may not have existed, as well as your assertion that Mary may not have been a teenager, are both WP:FRINGE beliefs that do not enjoy the favor of reputable scholarship. Both facts can be easily documented by myriad reliable secondary sources while your objections can only be sustained by citing a short list of certified kooks. Elizium23 (talk) 20:52, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Actually, Christians and Muslims are good examples of sources with excessive bias to treat as being reliable on this topic. As above, I await a list of non-Christian, non-Muslim historians that would verify the historicity of Christ and Mary. That controversy aside, what is the point of adding this information to the article? In what way does it enhance a reader's understanding of the topic of teenage pregnancy?—Kww(talk) 00:23, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

You exhibit a very poor understanding of the concept of WP:V and WP:RS. Bias is inherent in every secondary source, but not anathema to Wikipedia's policies for inclusion. Therefore the outrageously anti-Catholic National Catholic Reporter is accepted on this project as a source for articles about Catholicism, even though it badly misrepresents the faith with malicious intent. Non-Christian, non-Muslim sources are unneeded to support the assertions being made. Christian Biblical scholars are reliable sources for Biblical events because that is their area of expertise. So I don't understand what you are getting at with your opposition to this. Elizium23 (talk) 05:31, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

We are expected to weigh the potential bias of a source with respect to conclusions they have made. Always. I have no argument with the idea that Christians can be reliable sources for the beliefs of their faith. However, when someone considers a thing to be sacred, that's an insurmountable bias in regard to objectively investigating it and coming to conclusions about facts in regard to it. I would not, for example, use a source that believed in crystal healing in an article about quartz. I don't think many editors would, because we would all readily agree that the bias rendered the source excessively suspect. It should be an easy question: there are literally billions of Buddhists and millions of atheists and Jews in the world, and many of them are historians. What is the consensus among them about whether Mary and Jesus are historical figures?—Kww(talk) 01:13, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure that most Christians actually consider Mary to be "sacred". Maybe some Catholics do? Or in a loose sense that anything associated with any religion is sacred?

This atheist blog lists some of the modern scholars. You could see what they say. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:56, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

I have examined similar material, which is why I start from the position that our heavily cherry-picked article aside, there is no consensus that Mary and Jesus actually existed.—Kww(talk) 15:44, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Support as consistent with other examples of famous people from antiquity who born to teenaged mothers, referenced in the article. When dealing with ancient history there is always some uncertainty - I don't think it hurts to qualify the statement. —Sigeng (talk) 08:44, 3 December 2013 (UTC)
I believe that this history section is a list of trivia and should be removed, replaced with a better historical as proposed by FiachraByrne below. As such whether or not to include Mary is a moot point. –Sigeng (talk) 00:00, 7 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose - The article should not mention the fictional character of "Mary, Mother of Jesus", who's the mother of another fictional character as well. Adding controversial items like this to a Wikipedia legitimate article does nothing but make the article look silly. Guy1890 (talk) 00:45, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
Do you know of any reliable source describing either Jesus or Mary as fictional characters? St Anselm (talk) 00:53, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
- Once again, your opinion is classic WP:FRINGE Christ myth theory and refuted by myriad reliable secondary sources that can be cited for the historicity of Mary, the fact of her pregnancy, and the theory of her young age. Elizium23 (talk) 05:32, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose - The inclusion is unnecessary for the article's completeness. The inclusion is proven to be offensive to some editors, and may be offensive to some readers. Since its exclusion does no harm to the article it should be removed. - Amgine (talk) 04:45, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
- Please acquaint yourself with WP:NOTCENSORED and WP:NPOV. We cannot avoid representing a viewpoint because it may be offensive to some people. Take, for example, the subject of images of Muhammad on Wikipedia. Muslims react violently to seeing these and often remove them in good faith. However they must be retained because Wikipedia does not represent Islam but takes a neutral position and includes relevant encyclopedic information. So the offensiveness of Mary's presence in this article is utterly irrelevant to the criteria for her inclusion. Elizium23 (talk) 05:34, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
  - And, in a return favour, please acquaint yourself with Prof. Strunk's Rule 13, "Omit needless words." The example is unnecessary for the completeness of the article. It is also controversial. The most obvious solution, unless you have some reason or purpose other than informing the reader on the topic of the article, is to remove it. I stand by my opinion to oppose. - Amgine (talk) 21:33, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
    - That really is the key problem here: even if one stipulated that Mary had Jesus as a teenager, what is the value of mentioning it in an article about teenage pregancy?—Kww(talk) 01:20, 5 December 2013 (UTC)
      - I think the value in mentioning it is twofold: importantly, to educate everyone about how teenage motherhood was 100% normal in previous millenia, and less importantly, to educate the many readers who wrongly assumed (probably because of the inaccurate pictures they see in Christmas cards—have you ever seen one that showed Mary as a young teenager?) that Mary was in her 20s. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:56, 8 December 2013 (UTC
        If mentioning mary's pregnancy were 100% normal, then the inclusion wouldn't be controversial. As it is believed to have been astonishingly abnormal, it is unlikely to have either of the effects you say you believe it might have. The latter case has nothing to do with informing readers about teen pregnancy. The former case, however unlikely it is to have the desired effect, is still unnecessary, and so fails to justify the inclusion. - Amgine (talk) 03:52, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
        
        @WAID - depending on one's ideological alignment, that is very laudable but it's not an argument for the inclusion of content. The very concept of the "teenager" is largely anachronistic when applied to the pre-modern era, much less "teenage pregnancy". You need a source-based argument for this addition, and that is utterly lacking here. From what I've observed of your contributions to medical articles, you're an excellent editor. I couldn't imagine you making this kind of proposal if it involved medical content. I would expect you to consult the relevant sources and accurately summarise their findings. I wouldn't expect you to insert your ideological preferences either way. This underlines for me, again, the need for an equivalent to WP:MEDRS in other content areas. FiachraByrne (talk) 11:17, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
I'm confused - who was offended? Did you mean Christians or Muslims being offended at the thought of Mary having a teen pregnancy, or non-religious people getting offended at the thought of Mary being regarded as a real person? St Anselm (talk) 06:11, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose - The "issue" of teenage pregnancy - conceived until relatively recently as a social problem - is a modern one as in the pre-modern era teenage pregnancy was the norm. Therefore, I would argue, antique teenage pregnancies are just not salient to the subject of the article. The addition of such historical examples functions as an anachronism and distracts from, rather than illuminates, the article topic. Moreover, the source proposed to support this content is a biography of "Mary"/"VM" - it is not a source that actually treats of the article subject. To present a strong argument for its inclusion I would like to see a good secondary source, preferably by an expert in the field rather than a journalist or the like, whose subject focus is primarily on teen pregnancy and who elects to include VM in a list of relevant examples of notable teen pregnancies. Otherwise this, and frankly the other examples, are bollox and verging on original (and I'd think ill-judged) research conclusions. All in all,however, it's a relatively minor issue in what appears to be a fairly good article. FiachraByrne (talk) 02:32, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry I forgot to say that I came here by way of RFC noticeboard. FiachraByrne (talk) 02:42, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Just as an aside, I'd suggest that if "Mary" is relevant to this article and the construction of teenage pregnancy as a social problem it is her virginity rather than her status as an adolescent that is likely to be most notable, in Catholic countries at least. Also, while you could possibly argue that it is "the most famous birth in history" it is hardly famous for being a teen birth. FiachraByrne (talk) 03:10, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Just a final word. I would advocate the removal of most or all of the current "history" section as it is, for the most part, irrelevant to the topic and largely unsourced. I think the section should be rewritten from sources that discuss the emergence of teenage pregnancy as an identified social problem in some industrialised countries from the 1950s/60s/70s. Some sources that might be relevant include:

Furstenberg, Frank F. (2010). Destinies of the Disadvantaged: The Politics of Teenage Childbearing. Russell Sage Foundation. ISBN 978-1-61044-628-0. Chapter Five: The History of Teenage Childbearing as a Social Problem
Koffman, O. (2011). "Children having children? Religion, psychology and the birth of the teenage pregnancy problem". History of the Human Sciences. 25: 119–134. doi:10.1177/0952695111426383. Full text pdf of article
Vinovskis, M. A. (1981). "An "Epidemic" of Adolescent Pregnancy? Some Historical Considerations". Journal of Family History. 6 (2): 205–230. doi:10.1177/036319908100600206. PMID 11611795. Full text pdf of article
Vinovskis, M. A. (2003). "Historical perspectives on adolescent pregnancy and education in the United States". The History of the Family. 8 (3): 399–421. doi:10.1016/S1081-602X(03)00044-7.
Arney, W. R.; Bergen, B. J. (1984). "Power and visibility: The invention of teenage pregnancy". Social science & medicine (1982). 18 (1): 11–19. doi:10.1016/0277-9536(84)90339-3. PMID 6695198.
Arai, Lisa (2009). Teenage Pregnancy: The Making and Unmaking of a Problem. The Policy Press. ISBN 978-1-84742-074-9.
Cook, Hera (2007). "Teenage Pregnancy in England: A Historical Perspective". In Baker, Philip; Guthrie, Kate; Hutchinson, Cindy; Kane, Roslyn; Wellings, Kaye (ed.). Teenage Pregnancy and Reproductive Health. RCOG. pp. 3–16. ISBN 978-1-904752-38-7. {{cite book}}: External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link)

The above list is by no means exhaustive. FiachraByrne (talk) 10:35, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

You raised an excellent point regarding removal of the current history section and its replacement with more recent sources rather than specific historical people. It reads like an "in popular culture" section: irrelevant, vaguely related, not contributing to the overall article. I support removing or at least rewriting the history section (at least as a list of famous births). -Sigeng (talk) 22:06, 5 December 2013 (UTC)

Thank you and I'm in agreement with you about the typical value of most "in popular culture" sections in WP articles. It would be best if this section were re-written. FiachraByrne (talk) 17:17, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

I'd really like to see the section developed in a direction that clearly explains that "teenage pregnancy" used to be considered perfectly normal everywhere. Until then, I think that listing a few examples is not inappropriate—and more appropriate than failing to address the concept at all. The Mary example might be a perfectly good illustration of that fact: nearly all scholars agree that Mary was a teenage mother precisely because that was normal at the time. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:42, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

It's more complex than that (see the article above on the early-modern period) but wouldn't it be best to include content from sources that actually address the topic of the history of teenage pregnancy in a substantial way rather than rely on your judgement that this instance of teenage pregnancy is relevant to the topic. If this were a medical article you would seek to summarise what the best sources say on the issue, no? Why not apply the same logic here? FiachraByrne (talk) 11:14, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

Have you found any decent source that both discusses teenage births two millenia ago and doesn't mention Mary? I haven't (yet, but I've only begun looking, so it's possible that I'll find some). Most of the "history" sources you've listed don't even look back one full century from their publication dates. Providing the "pre-people deciding that teen births were a problem" natural history of pregnancy is relevant here. The history of teenagers giving birth does not begin with the moment when someone decided that they shouldn't. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:16, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but you've yet to present a scholarly source that deals substantially with teenage pregnancy in antiquity or even suggests it's a relevant category of discussion. Hazleton is not such a source, or even a particularly reliable source, because: a) its primary subject is Mary and not teenage pregnancy; and b), as your own commentary confirms, it "mixes fact with fiction". The fact that the sources I've listed, while far from exhaustive on the subject, locate teenage pregnancy as a phenomenon in the modern era should be a clue, and is certainly strongly indicative of the history and periodisation that most reliable sources identify as relevant to the subject of this article. Your opinion on the correct periodisation of "teenage pregnancy" is irrelevant - the content of the history section of the article should be determined by the best sources treating substantially of the subject of the article. I'm far from an expert in this area so if you present a scholarly source that identifies "teenage pregnancy" as a relevant and applicable concept for the antique era and also identifies Mary as exemplar of the phenomenon I will then seriously consider your proposed content addition. As of yet, however, you have not presented a source-based argument. FiachraByrne (talk) 12:02, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

Oppose Lack of reliable and specific sources, particularly in a contemporary sense. Scholarly agreement is merely a paper tiger created to disguise the fact that the original sources can't stand for themselves without extraordinary interpretation. (Cesdeva (talk) 00:33, 7 December 2013 (UTC))
I don't think I understand this. What "original sources"? There are no "original sources" that give Mary's age. They didn't have birth certificates or things like that back then. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:42, 8 December 2013 (UTC)

That's the point haha (Cesdeva (talk) 14:39, 8 December 2013 (UTC))

I don't think it's a very good point, then. There is no birth certificate or original records for the birth of any of the Roman emperors or any of the Greek philosophers: Shall we assume that there is no good reason, "without extraordinary interpretation", to believe that any of them existed either? "Let's mention that Christmas is a religious holiday that is generally believed (by the relevant scholars, not by your grandmother) to have involved a teenage mother" is not the same thing as saying "Let's assert that this person definitely existed and can definitely be proven to have given birth at this exact age." I am opposed to making statements of the second type in this article (or anywhere else, for that matter). WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:16, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

You forget that the Roman Emperors and the Greek Philosophers are themselves incredibly influential and important people of their time who feature in many records contemporary to themselves. The Greek philosophers created schools of thought that sculpted the minds of empires and formed the foundations of modern science and philosophy. Mary, if she existed, was a teenage mother in a world full of teenage mothers. Come on, gimme a break.

Whether a scholar looks at a lack of evidence, or my Grandmother, a lack of evidence is a lack of evidence. Providing the strained interpretation of a few biased academics doesn't make something true. (Cesdeva (talk) 16:47, 13 December 2013 (UTC))

Look at Pythagoras: "Most of the information about Pythagoras was written down centuries after he lived....Accurate facts about the life of Pythagoras are so few, and most information concerning him is of so late a date, and so untrustworthy, that it is impossible to provide more than a vague outline of his life. The lack of information by contemporary writers..." That sounds like the exact opposite of "featuring in many records contemporary to themselves" to me. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:21, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

Oppose on sources, as others have expressed it. You are on safer ground with Juliet, but the whole concept of Teenage pregnancy is really only relevant to the modern world, also as others have said. Johnbod (talk) 12:38, 8 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose per Johnbod et al. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:04, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose per Johnbod. United States Man (talk) 07:51, 21 December 2013 (UTC)
I support inclusion. The birth of Jesus is the most celebrated birth in history. If His mother is believed to have given birth to Him when she was a teenager than it should be mentioned. Until recently I was unaware that Mary had been so young when she gave birth to Jesus. Nor was I aware that the Prophet Muhammad married a 9 year old girl when he was over 50. These are two good examples of how teenage pregnancy and marriage was not seen as an issue worthy of a mention until recent times. Felann96 (talk) 03:46, 25 December 2013 (UTC)
Oppose per Johnbod, FiachraByrne, et al. (I was "randomly selected to receive an invitation to participate in the request for comment") --BoogaLouie (talk) 22:46, 29 December 2013 (UTC)
Support absolutely with reliable sources, and if there arent reliable sources we shouldnt even be discussing this♫ SqueakBox talk contribs 23:13, 29 December 2013 (UTC)
oppose She is famous because of motherhood, and she may have been a teen at the time, but she is not famous for being a teen mother. Additionally, the entire concept of "teen mother" means much more than the literal age. It is a shorthand for being a mother below the age a social/legal maturity, and generally a derogatory or negative label. there are no sources indicating that mary's age was unusual for being a mother 2000 years ago. Gaijin42 (talk) 01:28, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
Oppose inclusion. Not because of uncertain historicity (I consider that whole argument a red herring here), and not because of any concerns of it being offensive, but simply because it is of absolutely no information value. The only reason writers have inferred Mary may have been in her early teens when she gave birth is because that was the most normal thing to be in her time and culture. Therefore, saying that "Mary may have been in her early teens" is completely redundant to saying "in that time and culture, women tended to get married and have children in their early teens." This latter statement may well be of encyclopedic value to the article; picking out a single individual among the millions it applies to and naming her is of no value at all. Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:42, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Is there evidence that teenage pregnancy was normal in Biblical times? Felann96 (talk) 01:40, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

I would take it for granted that it was normal in pretty much all pre-modern societies. But I haven't read the sources; my point was that people in this discussion above cited a number of writers in (formally) "reliable" sources who were making that assumption about Mary, but that apparently the only reason any of them proposed that speculation was the idea that it was the normal thing for her time, whatever that idea in turn may be based on.

Consensus of RFC

I would tend to read the consensus of the RFC as going against the inclusion in the article of Mary, Mother of Jesus as a historical example of teenage pregnancy. Would others agree with this or does this RFC require a formal closure? FiachraByrne (talk) 01:29, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm not sure if there should be any examples given of births to teenage mothers. Compared to women in their twenties there are disproportionately more teenage pregnancies that end in miscarriages or maternal deaths or both. Felann96 (talk) 00:54, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Methinks your comments belong in the section above? FiachraByrne (talk) 01:30, 4 January 2014 (UTC)

OK. I'm going to ask for a formal closure then. FiachraByrne (talk) 01:12, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Request for closure. FiachraByrne (talk) 01:22, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Added Citations

Hi!

I added citations where there were citations needed as well as a few others. I'm editing Wikipedia as part of this course. Cwooli1 (talk) 22:51, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Definition

Please don't take offence anyone. I'm just looking at bits that could make the article better. These are just my observations and opinions. So don't feel I am picking holes just to be nasty!

Human females.......is it just me or does it make us sound like farm animals? Would it be better if it was simply "pregnancy in girls aged 13 to 19" ? Or would those aged over 18 object to being called "girls" ? Does "pregnancy in women aged 13 to 19" sound better? Or is "women" the wrong term too? I think "pregnancy in girls and women aged 13 to 19" is too long winded. What are your thoughts?

WhatamIdoing Why do we need to have "...under the age of 20 at the time that the pregnancy ends? To me if someone is pregnant at 19 they are a pregnant teenager irrespective of whether or not they are still pregnant when they become 20. Felann96 (talk) 19:37, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

We need to have this fact on the page so that people will know what these statistics represent. These statistics do not include women who get pregnant shortly before their 20th birthday. The statistics on teen pregnancy are collected pretty uniformly throughout the world as being under the age of 20 at the exact date that the pregnancy ends. If it's helpful, here's a worked example for a woman who conceived at the age of 19 years and 6 months:

If she miscarries at one month (19 years, 7 months): pregnant teen
If she has an induced abortion at two months (19 years, 8 months): pregnant teen
If she has an extremely preterm birth at five and a half months (19 years, 11 and a half months): pregnant teen
If she has a full-term birth at nine months (20 years, 3 months): not a pregnant teen.

A minority of studies (but not, AFAICT, any official reports) attempt to estimate the likely due date for elective abortions and classify them according to the date at the natural end. This has statistical value because it reduces the systemic bias if you're comparing abortions to births. Otherwise, all the abortions end up being an average of seven months younger than the births.

I suspect that the main reasons for this system are primarily practical: It's much easier to verify the date that the pregnancy ends than to find out when conception occurred. It's probably also based on the idea that society has a stronger and more legitimate interest in the ultimate result (a baby that is going to need food, clothing, shelter, and education) than in the mother's private sexual activity. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:00, 2 September 2013 (UTC)

If a 19 year old is pregnant how would you know if she is a pregnant teenager? Felann96 (talk) 12:41, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

How would you know if she's pregnant at all?

If a woman turns 20 during the pregnancy, is that still a "teenage pregnancy"?

It doesn't really matter what seems reasonable to you. This is what the sources say: a woman who is 19 when the pregnancy starts, but 20 when it ends, is not counted as having a teenage pregnancy. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:52, 3 September 2013 (UTC)

As stated in the #Are the opening paragraphs (up to contents) too drawn out and elaborate? section above, there is now a Definition section that addresses what WhatamIdoing means by "under 20" on this matter. Flyer22 (talk) 17:24, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I still prefer the literal meaning of Teenage Pregnancy. Although I agree that dates when pregnancies end are easier to verify than dates of conception, many surveys of teenage pregnancies do in fact use estimated dates when conception occurred in their studies. Also most surveys of teenage pregnancies only include girls aged over 15 in their statistics.Felann96 (talk) 01:10, 16 October 2013 (UTC) Here are links which show that the UK government still use estimated dates of conception in their statistics : http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/vsob1/conception-statistics--england-and-wales/2011/sty-conception-estimates-2011.html http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17190185 Felann96 (talk) 22:27, 22 December 2013 (UTC)

Teenage pregnancy should be simply be about teenagers that are pregnant. I cannot see the need for such a precise definition for a general article of the subject. AlwynJPie (talk) 21:56, 24 August 2014 (UTC)

Most people understand teenage pregnancy as being about teenagers that are pregnant. There is no need to complicate the meaning for an article like this. AlwynJPie (talk) 22:38, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

What complication are you referring to? You object to the "under the age of 20 at the time that the pregnancy ends" wording? You object to the Definition section? Plenty of Wikipedia articles have a Definition section. Having one in this article is valid, given what is discussed in it. Flyer22 (talk) 22:45, 30 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Flyer22. What right has Wikipedia to define the meaning of the article Teenage Pregnancy to exclude teenagers that were pregnant at 19 because their pregnancy did not end until they were 20 just because a specific method of collecting statistics uses the age of when pregnancy ends (which is done purely for the convenience of data gathering)? There are many pregnant 19 year olds that have issues in relation to their pregnancies whether their pregnancy ends when they are still 19 or continues until they are 20. AlwynJPie (talk) 23:18, 5 September 2014 (UTC)

It may not be as practical when it comes to collecting data, but I think this article should be about all those that are pregnant under 20. The age they are when their pregnancy ends should not be part of the article definition. AlwynJPie (talk) 04:55, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

If there is no objection I will change the definition to so that it includes any pregnant teenager. AlwynJPie (talk) 22:35, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

AlwynJPie, of course there is an objection. You can see that above. People not responding to you does not automatically mean that they don't object to what you are stating. It can mean that they are tired of debating this topic. If you want WhatamIdoing's attention on this matter, there I've pinged her via WP:Echo in this paragraph. But I think that this article/talk page is still on her WP:Watchlist. Flyer22 (talk) 22:45, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Flyer22. Do you have any opinions on this? AlwynJPie (talk) 23:31, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

I don't know about Flyer22, but I certainly do: the definition in the article should correspond to the definition used in the sources the article uses.—Kww(talk) 23:55, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Something doesn't feel right to me about not including all pregnant teenagers in the article. I realise older teenagers are less likely to have problems in relation to pregnancy than younger ones, but some twenty-year-olds are still not fully mature. AlwynJPie (talk) 02:09, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

"Wikipedia" isn't asserting the right to define anything. Wikipedia is accurately reporting what published WP:Reliable sources say that the definition is, according to the agencies that have actually been using that definition, in some cases for more than a century, in all of these statistics. If you don't like the definition, because it doesn't match up with your interpretation of the name, then your next step needs to be contacting several thousand government agencies and convincing them that a woman who gets pregnant the night before her 20th birthday ought to be counted as a "teenage pregnancy", rather than complaining that we're accurately reporting their definition.

Your personal beliefs about the likelihood of a 20 year old being emotional mature are irrelevant. When they made up this definition, the issue in their minds had nothing to do with emotions, and everything to do with medical complications and economic power. In fact, they were concerned not about "teenage pregnancy" so much as they were concerned with "teenage motherhood": It wasn't really about whether teens were having sex (because more of them were married or engaged to be married back then, so sexual activity was expected). It was about whether they and their babies were going to live or die, and whether they would end up being charity cases. (Also, they thought that 20 year olds were mature, and that even 16 year olds ought to be able to run a household on their own. This was back when an 8th grade education was considered enough for most people, and when children were economically productive by age 10 or 12.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:45, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Because "it's much easier to verify the date that the pregnancy ends than to find out when conception occurred" should not bear any influence on the definition of this article. Because pregnancies in 19-year-olds that don't end until they are 20 are not counted in the statistics, does not mean they were not pregnant teenagers. Please show WP:Reliable sources to some of the "several thousand government agencies" that you claim define teenage pregnancy in the way you say. AlwynJPie (talk) 02:04, 1 December 2014 (UTC)

The fact that "it's much easier to verify the date that the pregnancy ends than to find out when conception occurred" is exactly why, in the 19th century, those now-dead white men came up with that definition. Remember, they started these statistics back when people honestly believed that a pregnancy could last for over a year, or that a healthy baby could be delivered in an unusually short period of time, and when women had every reason in the world to insist that they'd never had sex until their wedding nights (or when their husbands were gone for months due to military service, etc).

As for supplying sources, if you read either the article or the archives, you'll find that I already have. I notice that you haven't supplied a single source to back up your folk etymology that says a woman who gets pregnant on the night before her 20th birthday is a "teenage mother", though. Maybe you should spend some time looking for sources that use alternative definitions? If you don't want to read a bunch of scholarly articles (like I did), then another option for you is to write to the Guttmacher Institute and request their help in understanding the definition that is used for statistics. The contact link is http://www.guttmacher.org/about/info.php Of course, they're just going to tell you the same thing that I did, but perhaps you'll like it better if you hear it from them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:18, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

A reminder to AGF, everyone, and civilly explain which definition has sourced support. Have some tea? American Barbarian | talk 02:39, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Americanbarbarian, how long have you been editing Wikipedia? I mean, before or after the American Barbarian account that you created on July 14, 2011? It's easy for me to see, looking at your relatively few contributions, and how you are already familiar with WP:AGF, that you are significantly familiar with editing Wikipedia. Also, there's no need to ping me to this talk page via WP:Echo, if you reply to me here. And, yes, I'd prefer that you reply to me here, not on my talk page, about this. Flyer22 (talk) 03:09, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Oh, I only recently decided to start editing actively. Still feeling my way around. I created my account a few years ago and let it gather dust for a while. I just noticed this conversation in recent changes and thought it was getting a bit heated - but that might just be me. American Barbarian | talk 03:22, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks WhatamIdoing for your reply. I agree it is easier to obtain accurate dates of when a pregnancy ends compared to when a pregnancy starts but a pregnant 19 year old should be regarded as a pregnant teenager irrespective of whether that pregnancy ends when she is still 19 or lasts until she is 20. Methods used to obtain statistical information on a subject should have no baring on the definition of that subject. I have not been able to obtain sourced support for the definition of teenage pregnancy from your links or elsewhere. AlwynJPie (talk) 03:05, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Have you been able to find any definitions yet, or have you not progressed that far? I know that it's not actually the easiest thing to find on the web, so I'll help you out:

Go to the article page and scroll down to the section ==Definition==. See the little blue [9]? Click that. You don't even need to read the source, because I've provided a direct quotation, which includes an exact, complete, word-for-word copy of their definition. Read the words, especially the ones at the end, which say, "women who conceived at age 19 had their births or abortions after they turned 20...were not counted as teenagers".

I don't care whether women conceiving before their 20th birthdays "should be" regarded as teenage mothers. I care whether they "actually are" regarded as pregnant teenagers by the WP:reliable sources (e.g., not by the high school students who frequent this page). As you can see from this quotation, they "actually are not" regarded as pregnant teens, no matter what you or anyone else believes. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:35, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Because some women that were pregnant at 19 are not included in some statistics does not mean they should not be regarded as having been pregnant teenagers. AlwynJPie (talk) 17:20, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

It's not "some statistics". It's "all statistics".

If you want this changed, then you need to find a high-quality WP:Reliable source (i.e., not your own idea of what the words "ought" to mean) and present it here. Until then, we really cannot make the change you propose. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:24, 27 January 2015 (UTC)

The "date when pregnancy ends" method of evaluating teenage pregnancy rates is NOT universal; many authorities use "date of conception" in their statistics of teenage pregnancies. http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/vsob1/conception-statistics--england-and-wales/2012/index.html AlwynJPie (talk) 01:34, 16 September 2015 (UTC)

The Lead

I transfered the second paragraph as I thought it went a little too deep for the lead, and also because the third paragraph said roughly the same thing as the second but not in as much detail. AlwynJPie (talk) 07:11, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

I also think the last paragraph in the lead "Teenage pregnancies appear to be preventable by comprehensive sex education and ..." is better suited elsewhere in the article. AlwynJPie (talk) 07:25, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

I reverted you on this because, as noted in my edit summary, the lead is meant to summarize the article...per WP:Lead. From what I saw, you had cut too much. That stated, I now see the redundancy when comparing the second and third paragraphs, and that obviously needs tweaking; the redundancy needs to be removed, but the important aspects should stay. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 09:47, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

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Neutrality

Currently, this article frames teenage pregnancy as a problem, describing causes, negative effects, and prevention methods in detail, while omitting positive effects, causes of suppression, effective methods of encouraging freedom of choice. The article clearly reflects a tenor in 20th-century public policies, but fails to conceptualize teenage pregnancy as a societal task that most industrialized societies failed and still fail to cope with. Furthermore, correlations with health and education are worthless if third factors like poverty, educational background of the young parents, and migration aren't controlled, as done in contemporary scientific studies. --PanchoS (talk) 15:29, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

These are high risk pregnancies with a greater chance of negative outcomes. This is stats. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:20, 13 June 2016 (UTC)

Pregnancies of 12 or 13 years old, okay. But not pregnancies of 18 or 19 year old women, and clearly depending on societal circumstances, so not uniformly the case throughout the world. --PanchoS (talk) 16:10, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

Thus the article says "There are, however, additional medical concerns for pregnant girls aged under 15, who are less likely to have become physically developed enough to sustain a healthy pregnancy or to give birth.[4] For girls aged 15–19 risks are associated more with socioeconomic factors than with the biological effects of age.[5]" Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 01:53, 15 June 2016 (UTC)

Second picture of miserable looking pregnant teens

I've removed the picture of miserable looking pregnant teens because doesn't it reinforce the idea that pregnancy of teens is something that should be miserable and sad? People looking at it will perceive that as the way to deal with people and issues of teen pregnancy. Depicting teen pregnancy in that way will only acerbate the issues surrounding teen pregnancy.

117.221.184.146 (talk) 18:18, 4 September 2016 (UTC)Atnhead

Would somebody please fact-check this graph and post it if correct?

I looked to my favorite source to fact-check a facebook page regarding how the teenage pregnancy rate has evolved in recent years. That led me to this image, supported by the link shown below. I do physics, not sociology and don't feel qualified to judge the reliability of this source:

https://www.guttmacher.org/sites/default/files/report_downloads/us-teen-pregnancy-trends-2011_tables.pdf

Yours truly, Guy vandegrift (talk) 16:48, 15 January 2017 (UTC)

The table was later included in this report: Kost, Kathryn; Maddow-Zimet, Isaac (April 2016). "U.S. Teenage Pregnancies, Births and Abortions, 2011: National Trends by Age, Race and Ethnicity". Guttmacher Institute.. I've added that source to the image. StarryGrandma (talk) 20:33, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

The age disparity section

I'm not especially keen on relying on FRC as an intermediate source, but the authorities they are working from are perfectly sound, and when it comes down to it simply excising the section basically is an instance of exactly what they are complaining about. Mangoe (talk) 12:54, 8 March 2017 (UTC)

Having a chance now to have read all of the sources I had listed at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Use_of_the_Family_Research_Council_as_a_reliable_source.3F and more, I have no choice but to remove the content sourced to the FRC. This is actually an extremely complicated question, and many primary sources of equivalent merit come to diametrically opposing conclusions about the effect of the relative age of the mother and father. I can find you primary sources that say teenage pregnancy is associated with an older father, a younger father, or that the age of the father is totally irrelevant. I can find you these three categories of papers in about equal proportion. Papers differ in their choice of study population, their methods of data gathering, and their means of correcting for various confounding variables. As I said at RSN, the FRC piece only included a single source in its bibliography that directly addressed this question. Either the author of that piece is unaware of the wider literature on the subject, or deliberately cherry picked one study that helped make a point. Either way, I would rather have no section on this subject, than a section sourced to a publisher with an overt political agenda. Someguy1221 (talk) 01:57, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for checking that through. Mangoe (talk) 15:10, 14 March 2017 (UTC)

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Contraception

In the United State one third of high school students reported being sexual active (child trends). In 2011-2013 79% of females reported using contraception and 21% of females are not using any type of contraception (Martinez, Abma). Teens who are sexually active are at risk for teen pregnancy, STD, and depression. Teenage pregnancy puts young woman at risk for health issues, economic, social and financial issues (CDC). Teenage pregnancy has dropped to an all-time low down 57% from 1991 primarily because of the increase use of contraception in teens (Lindberg, Santelli, Desai)Akennedy1985 (talk) 03:07, 26 July 2017 (UTC)^[1] ^[2] ^[3]

Not all of this is effects of teen pregnancy. Thus some was placed in the wrong spot. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:16, 26 July 2017 (UTC)

Refs

Possible additions to education section: Articles:

Bleakley, A., Hennessy, M., & Fishbein, M. (2006). Public Opinion on Sex Education in US Schools. Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, 160(11), 1151-1156. doi:10.1001/archpedi.160.11.1151

Kirby, D., Laris, B., & Rolleri, L. (2007). Sex and HIV Education Programs: Their Impact on Sexual Behaviors of Young People Throughout the World. Journal of Adolescent Health, 40(3), 206-217. doi:10.1016/j.jadohealth.2006.11.143

Lara, L., & Abodo, C. (2016). Age at Time of Initial Sexual Intercourse and Health of Adolescent Girls. Journal of Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology, 29(5), 417-423. doi:10.1016/j.jpag.2015.11.012

McManus, A., & Dhar, L. (2008). Study of knowledge, perception and attitude of adolescent girls towards STIs/HIV, safer sex and sex education. BMC Women’s Health, 8(1). doi:10.1186/1472-6874-8-12

Santelli, J., Lindberg, L., Finer, L., & Singh, S. (2007). Explaining Recent Declines in Adolescent Pregnancy in the United States: The Contribution of Abstinence and Improved Contraceptive Use. American Journal of Public Health, 97(1), 150-156. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2006.089169

Shtarkshall, R. A., Santelli, J. S., & Hirsch, J. S. (2007). Sex Education and Sexual Socialization: Roles for Educators and Parents. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, 39(2), 116–119. doi:10.1363/3911607

Wellings, K., Wadsworth, J., Johnson, A., Field, J., Whitaker, L., & Field, B. (1995). Provision Of Sex Education And Early Sexual Experience: The Relation Examined. BMJ: British Medical Journal, 311(7002), 417-420. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/29728378

Wight, D., & Abraham, C. (2000). From psycho-social theory to sustainable classroom practice: developing a research-based teacher-delivered sex education programme. Health Education Research, 15(1), 25-38. doi:10.1093/her/15.1.25 — Preceding unsigned comment added by ChristineGrigs (talk • contribs) 16:58, 31 July 2017 (UTC)

Please read WP:MEDRS. Best Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 22:08, 16 August 2017 (UTC)

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Media

hello fellow wikipedians, — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaliyahx33 (talk • contribs) 18:02, 30 April 2018 (UTC) i wanted to add more to the media section. I felt like there wasnt alot that talked about the affects and non affects of media. "A study conducted in 2006 found that adolescents who were more exposed to sexuality in the media were also more likely to engage in sexual activity themselves.", i feel this topic could be added on more from other sources. Park, Alice (November 3, 2008). would like to know what you guys think.

Sorry for the revert but imo its necessary

Revert- I reverted one last edit made by Aaliyahx33 -.. I dont really knwo how much wiki works and its late and I'm tired but I have read the pages here (http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources#Questionable_and_self-published_sources) and so linking this: https://storify.com/Schmub13/environment-and-teen-pregnancy looks is definitively not a RS and to me it appears also as a self link (i tried to open t but the server seems to be overworked so I can't see what it says)

Oh and the link given for for the "teenager imitate sex they see in the tv" is a time article which 1. is like 10 years old and 2. references a study that isnt linked in the article.. I mean I've learned something like "scientist found out in study..that mom that drink more coke have healthier babies" .. so idk, can maybe someone find that sdy? and then someone who notes that reality, ie the development in the last years has basically disproven this "thesis" of the conservative institute, as rates for UK and for the US have shrunken down despite mobile internet offering easy access o hardcore pornography(and without rate of abortion rising up.)

(anekdota... I AM NOT implying i want anything I post now posted on the article (because that would be synthesis and OR I think?)0 ,its just something I find interesting.. If it was the monkey see, monkey sex, germany would have o swim in teenage pregnancies starting with 14 /age of consent), but maybe a third has first sex with 16 and still very few pregnancies, but I was able t watch emmanuelle at night on the tv and breasts are everywhere. like in a Tv spot advertising for margarine.. so.. there is a lot of sex around and well the internet too. Still, germany still has a tee pregnancy rate of 7,7/1000 .. UK had around 23, the US 30 in 2012 (sed data from the WHO (I can look tomorrow and link it here) and https://www.guttmacher.org/sites/default/files/report_downloads/us-teen-pregnancy-trends-2011_tables.pdf)

tl:dr I dont think any sources Aaliyahx33 posted fits RS.

but as I am no wikipedia editor I need someone who knows what they do and how to determine RS and then how to proceed adequate,

I'm sure there will be better sources than a twitter archive (storify) .https://storify.com/Schmub13/environment-and-teen-pregnancy an old article http://content.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1855842,00.html and a young one I dont know about this HP (sr https://www.more.com/lifestyle/does-media-affect-teen-pregnancyc.. ?

and the opinion of someone relevant(?) on an ancient private homepage that really hard to read

http://home.earthlink.net/~mmales/yt-sex.htm

..now its 2 hours later and I am so sleepy I am sure this will have horrid typos I hope its still understandable. thx and good night I'll try to make this chaos bit more coherent

2A02:8109:13C0:39D0:909C:8143:F25D:35ED (talk) 00:26, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

(was 4 tilde right?

List of births to mothers who are 18 and 19

We have "7.3 million females under age 18 give birth per year" in developing countries.

Adding in those who are 18 and 19 is not that notable. How does this list of trivia add to the article?

Per Teenage_pregnancy#History. A notable teenage pregnancy IMO must occur at least under the age of 18. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:24, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

List

The pregnancy should not be treated as notable just because the person is. Such a list should have very stringent qualifying criteria to avoid being arbitrary wp:listcruft. Sources should be very good to ensure compliance with wp:BLP. Until such critera are spelled out, I am going to wp:BOLDly delete the section. LeadSongDog come howl! 18:57, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Sure sounds good. With respect to criteria:

1) Under the age of 18

2) Significant indepth media coverage of the event and its significance / not just in passing mention Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:30, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

I would add

3)consent to publication by the named (or implied) individuals

4)exceptional relevance, as stated in the source (e.g. someone who caused laws, attitudes or general practices to change)

LeadSongDog come howl! 20:49, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Excluding older teens makes the article more sensationalistic and a less fair description of reality. One of the things that's important to communicate in this article is that giving birth (or obtaining an abortion, or experiencing pregnancy loss) on the day before the 20th birthday is a "teenage pregnancy". Most Americans think that the cutoff is age 17 years and 364 days, but most teenage pregnancies are legal adults (under the American model, which does not apply to every culture).

I think that it's perfectly valid to include examples from royalty, although I'd suggest a much shorter list. For example, both of Henry V of England's parents were teenagers. His mother was about 17, and his father (the future king) was 19. But I wouldn't have a long description; I'd just say "Many kings and queens were the result of teenage pregnancies, including <list of examples>". I think that consent is mostly irrelevant when both the parents and the child(ren) are dead, but I think that it can easily be assumed for royalty. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:38, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Except, of course, that in 15th-century England there were no teenagers: that's an anachronism. Both Bolingbroke and de Bohun were "young adults" (if they were anything), but they certainly weren't the youngest examples we could find if we chose. For the purposes of this article, we should concentrate on what reliable sources describe as being teenage pregnancies in the modern understanding of the phrase. Also, it having to occur before the 20th birthday might not apply to other societal models. Incidentally, I very much approve of your removal of that list: I can't see it passing WP:LISTN in a month of Sundays. ——SerialNumber54129 15:11, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Support removal of list. Not a notable thing, entirely legal in many jurisdictions, and would require millions of entries. -- The Anome (talk) 15:54, 2 November 2018 (UTC)

Stale sources

Much of this article is voiced in the present tense, yet backed by sources that are more than ten years old, and in many cases more than twenty years old. The statistics those sources document are from even earlier times. This needs a thorough cleanup. LeadSongDog come howl! 20:10, 9 November 2018 (UTC)

Paternal age effect

Why is this article so small compared to the Paternal age effect article? Seems ridiculous. Compare:

A study in 2006 of 132,000 Israeli adolescents discovered men in their 30s are 1.6 times as likely to have a child with autism as men under 30, with men in their 40s having a sixfold increase in risk [15] Further studies in Sweden (2.6 million children),[16] Denmark (2.98 million),[17] and an international dataset of 5.7 million children [18] showed a definite link between increased paternal age and autism risk. A widely-referenced Icelandic whole-genome sequencing effort led by Kári Stefánsson of DEcode Genetics and published in Nature also concluded similarly.[19]

To this:

Teen mothers are more likely to drop out of high school.

I'm just advocating a little equality in the debate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.77.213.157 (talk) 01:05, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

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Requested move 2 September 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not Moved - per consensus on WP:COMMONNAME which does not preclude inclusion of relevant information on the periphery of the literal article title. Mike Cline (talk) 12:12, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

Teenage pregnancy → Adolescent pregnancy – Although "teen pregnancy" and "teenage pregnancy" are more commonly used, I think this page would benefit more from being moved to "Adolescent pregnancy" for the following reasons:

Since "teenage" exclusively means the ages between 13 and 19, this implies that the numbers ending in "teen" have a magical power inaccessible before one's 13th birthday or vanished by their 20th birthday, which is obviously unrealistic. Since "teenage" is in the title, information about pregnant girls under 13 or pregnant young women in their early 20s isn't relevant to the age range specified in-title, but at the same time the information is crucial since preteen girls and young women in their early 20s are similarly affected as early teens and late teens respectively and basing a dividing line on numeral semantics is ludicrous. The only way to make the information about preteens and early 20s relevant is to replace "Teenage" in the title with "Adolescent".
I also don't think "Underage pregnancy" would work either since female minors over the age of consent are still physically at risk and lack a fully mature pelvic atructure, in addition to being socioeconomically undeveloped, hence why comprehensive approaches to sex education strongly recommend them to use birth control or for their male partner to wear a condom should they engage in vaginal intercourse. Thus, "adolescent pregnancy" covers a more diverse range of ages encompassing the gradual physical maturation of a fertile female without being limited to legal matters or a number pattern.
I know the article is focused more on 15-19-year-olds than 13 or 14-year-olds, but covering pregnancy in early teens within the same article as mid-to-late teens just because their numerical ages all share a linguistic pattern is misleading and harmful because early teens are still children who are under the age of consent, and they often get pregnant for different reasons than older teens (rape, incomplete sexual education with not enough understanding about safe sex).
Most adolescence-based articles (e.g. Adolescent sexuality) use "Adolescent" in the title instead of "Teenage" or "Teen".

By the way, I think we should create a separate article for underage pregnancies in preteen and early teen girls since they already exist in category form and to differentiate between biologically and legally harmful pregnancies in early pubescent girls under the age of consent vs. socioeconomically harmful pregnancies in mid-to-late teens and early 20-somethings who are of legal consenting age and past puberty but not yet experientially mature to raise a child. There's already a significant amount of coverage for the former at Child sexual abuse (which also includes cases of older teens above the age of consent who were raped by legal adults of a significant age and power difference) and at Statutory rape regarding close-in-age minors, but I think underage pregnancies are distinct enough from general adolescent pregnancy to sustain a standalone page. WashyGenius (talk) 09:24, 2 September 2022 (UTC)

oppose per WP:COMMONNAME—blindlynx 14:03, 2 September 2022 (UTC)
Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME.--Ortizesp (talk) 16:22, 2 September 2022 (UTC)
@Blindlynx: @Ortizesp: Would you two at least be supportive of including information on preteen pregnancies within the article despite it primarily being focused on teenagers? Since the opening and infobox list "Adolescent pregnancy" as an alternative name, I don't see why we couldn't. If not, would it at least be notable to create a separate article on underage pregnancy for girls under the age of consent who get pregnant through rape/child sexual abuse or through statutory rape regarding nonforcible unprotected intercourse with close-in-age boy partners? Since the teenage pregnancy article itself focuses more on 15-19-year-old girls than rape victims, I think a separate article on underage pregnancies in preteens and early teens would be quite necessary. Also what about pregnancy in young women in their early 20s? Is there a dividing line between 19/20 aside from the "teen" numeral which makes a woman less at risk regarding pregnancy once she turns 20? Or do we have a separate article for young women in their early 20s who get pregnant? WashyGenius (talk) 21:28, 2 September 2022 (UTC)
- I see no issues with including preteens in this article. Not sure if there's enough information for a whole separate article since I think preteen births are generally bundled under teenage births. Regarding the cutoff age on the upper end, I have no thoughts since I assume the definition is different country per country.--Ortizesp (talk) 21:31, 2 September 2022 (UTC)
Yes, but start a separate thread on this. —blindlynx 21:35, 2 September 2022 (UTC)
Weak support the current title may be more common in general but the move would make it clearer that it deals with younger girls who may otherwise be regarded as being children but for the fact they have reached child bearing age. Possibly splitting the article may also work but that would probably create more confusion. Crouch, Swale (talk) 08:16, 4 September 2022 (UTC)
Neutral. Despite the recent infantilization of twenty-somethings, they are not adolescents. The better term for twenty-somethings is emerging adulthood. Jeffrey Arnett, a psychology professor, states that twenty-somethings are not adolescents. 25 is not the new 18. I don't oppose grouping tween, teenage and under 25/early 20s pregnancies together, but adolescent pregnancy doesn't seem like the right term. When one turns 20, they are no longer a teenager (even if some modern fields of psychology think it ends at 25). cookie monster 755 01:20, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
- All true no doubt, but how is this relevant? We are talking about changing from "Teenage" to "adolescent". Ok I see there was a question above, but even so. Johnbod (talk) 03:48, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Comment – WashyGenius the main article suggest Adolescence is 10-24, so I guess you make a valid point about covering early 20s pregnancies and moving it to adolescence pregnancy (though my concerns above still are on the record). I will move to support the page move and include pregnancies under 25 for consistency with other related articles. cookie monster 755 01:31, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

"Traditionally, it includes ages 10 to 19, but an expansive definition includes ages 10 to 24 to account for a more comprehensive understanding of this phase of life." - only in America, I expect. A term that covers 10 to 24 is simply too broad to be useful. The article has been written to match the existent title, so when you say "and include pregnancies under 25" are you proposing to do the considerable extra writing? If not, who will (WashyGenius is now banned)? Johnbod (talk) 03:56, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

Oppose per WP:COMMONNAME, and because the article has been, rather carefully, written to cover women under 20, & I don't see anyone proposing to do the considerable extra work refitting it to a new title, especially a vague one which, just according to references above, might end at 17, or at 24. Johnbod (talk) 04:02, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
Oppose – The average person does not think of someone in this age range when they're talking about teenage pregnancy and they call it that instead of adoloscent pregnancy. Clovermoss (talk) 11:35, 6 September 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Removal of "young adult" in the intro

I think "young adult" should be removed from the intro as although 18-19 year olds are legally considered adults, they are still technically adolescents as adolescence is 10 to 19.212.39.89.71 (talk) 12:12, 24 April 2023 (UTC)

[1] Hazleton, Lesley (2005). Mary: A Flesh-and-Blood Biography of the Virgin Mother. Bloomsbury USA. pp. 20–25. ISBN 1-58234-475-2.

[childtrends-2] ttps://www.childtrends.org/publications/teen-pregnancy-prevention-research-based-policy-recommendations-executive-legislative-officials-2017/

[guttmacher-3] ttps://www.guttmacher.org/fact-sheet/american-teens-sexual-and-reproductive-health?gclid=CjwKCAjw2NvLBRAjEiwAF98GMQqf1xcR9rVqYsvgDK2DXSX3yx-zgoVEevTqbMfRFLVGJBxlD-FuJRoCUL0QAvD_BwE#26

[cdc-4] ttps://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2015/p0407-teen-pregnancy.html

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