Qualitative Media Research Assignment One

2008-02-14T11:36:00.000-08:00

The Sociological Review

"Low expectations, sexual attitudes and knowledge: explaining teenage pregnancy and fertility in English communities. Insights from qualitative research

By: Lisa Arai

Teenage pregnancy is a phenomenon many people try to understand. Many studies have been done to try and grasp an understanding of teenage pregnancy, including qualitative research on young mothers in English communities. Lisa Arai also tries to gain a better knowledge on this subject in her study of teenage pregnancy and fertility in English communities that was published in The Sociological Review.

Naturalistic Observation

The researchers of this study interviewed nine young mothers who worked as local coordinators at the TPU (Teenage Pregnancy Unit). The interviews of these women took place over the phone, for their schedule was too hectic to talk face to face and they wanted to protect their privacy. The interviews of these women varied in length of time and range/depth of subjects covered. They discussed what the teenage reproductive scenario in the coordinator’s area was like, what their personal perception of teenage pregnancy was, and if they believed early motherhood could be beneficial. There was also data collected from interviews with 12 mothers who had had children before the age of 20. These interviews were in-depth and face-to-face. They lasted anywhere from 45-60 minutes. One problem researchers encountered was that many of the women had their babies with them, which interrupted the interview on many accounts and became quite a distraction. I did not find that the researchers did anything else that involved naturalistic observation. They didn’t do anything to put themselves in the women’s shoes other than the interviews.

Contextualization

When it comes to contextualization, I found that teenage pregnancy for a woman who came from a middle class background and had academic and working goals differed from a woman who had a deprived lifestyle in a working class environment and didn’t like school. For young women who have endured distress at an early time in their life, sometimes felt that having a baby was seen as relatively normal behavior, for they want to give their child a better life than they had themselves; whereas women who got pregnant at an early age and had a good upbringing were discouraged about the fact that they were pregnant. While some young mothers felt having a child at such an early age was a burden, others felt it was a blessing. One women commented on the fact that having a child was a blessing in disguise, for if she was not a mother she would being doing a lot worse and would probably using drugs. Depending on the person, being a young parent can be seen as a good thing or a bad thing.

Maximize Comparisons

To maximize comparisons, the researchers interviewed women from different backgrounds and diverse communities in England. The young women interviewed were not from the same areas as the TPU coordinators that took part in the telephone interviews, but they all represented both urban and rural areas, from the north and south, and also had different adolescent reproductive scenarios. The majority of the women recognized the link between deprivations, or living in a deprived area with motherhood, whether they were from a place like that or not. Sexual attitudes and knowledge about contraception differed among the coordinators and the young mothers interviewed. The idea that lack of sexual knowledge was the reason for becoming pregnant is dismissed in this study, for nine women said that they had been using contraception during the time in which they got pregnant. The majority of the women had been on the pill, and several mentioned defective condoms. Two respondents also mentioned that they had used the morning after pill, which had not worked. Several women discussed the option of abortion and how they didn’t believe in it. Women who were pro-choice talked about how having a child was the only way they thought they could experience love; that the love between a mother and child was something they had always longed for. I believe the researchers did a good job at maximizing comparisons, for there is only so many things that you can compare in regards to teenage pregnancy, and for the most part, they covered them well.

Sensitized Concepts

The researchers of this study definitely utilized many sensitized concepts. The women interviewed provided many personal stories and descriptions about their experiences with teenage pregnancy. Some women described what their experience in school was like, whether they just merely disliked it and still did well, or if they were troublemakers and didn’t prosper academically. Many discussed how having a child at a young age made them turn their life around. It made them aware of the fact that they need some sort of education/job. Several of the TPU coordinators talked about their experiences with young mothers at the centers that they worked for. One woman spoke about a time when she went to a young mother’s group in her area and when she got there, the women were very hostile towards her. “My job is to stop young people having babies, that’s how they saw it and I was really upset because they were feeling pretty pissed off and didn’t want to talk to me...after talking to them they could see in the end that I wasn’t the enemy.” While this study used personal stories from the women they interviewed, they could have provided more descriptive stories and analogies.

Overall I feel this is a fairly decent study. It obtained much of the criteria needed to be a thorough qualitative research assessment, but it could definitely be more solid in naturalistic observation and sensitized concepts.

Katie G Money

Qualitative Media Research Assignment One