School-age parents: how permanent a relationship?

One hundred eighty school-age girls who registered for care in a prenatal clinic were studied through two years postpartum. At registration, the mean age of the pregnant girls was 15.6 and the putative fathers was 18.5 years. Many of the fathers continued to see the young mothers, to provide financial support, and to visit their children. By 26 months after delivery, however, only 23% of the mothers had married the putative fathers, 23% still were seeing them regularly, 18% saw them occasionally, and 35% either never saw them or had married someone else. Only 25% of the mothers who expected to marry the putative father did so. The study findings have significant implications for the inclusion of putative fathers in programs for school-age mothers.