Women who have their first child before the age of 20 are at a higher risk of chronic diseases and death when they reach middle age, a new study shows.
The study, which appears in the September issue of the ‘Journal of Health and Social Behavior’, said that women who are single at the time they have their first baby could also be at risk of earlier death — an outcome that probably relates to socio-economic status later in life after having a child as a young, single woman.
“Being unmarried at the time of first birth is associated with lower midlife income and a lower probability of being married in midlife,” said study author John Henretta at the University of Florida.
“It’s not so much the characteristic of being unmarried at first birth that’s important; it’s what being unmarried at first birth tells us about the midlife status of these women.” Henretta evaluated data from the Health and Retirement Study, focusing on 4,335 women born in the United States between 1931 and 1941.
These women were first interviewed in 1992 (at ages 51 to 61) and then followed until 2002. Interviewers were asked about their health, level of education, marital status, wealth, how many children they had and the age of each living child.