This study examined patterns, variations, and existential turning points in young mothers' narratives of self and their visions of the future as part of a larger hermeneutic, longitudinal study. The study was philosophically based in the phenomenology of everyday practices as inherently meaningful, situated, and historically derived and drew on dialogical views of the self. The sample consisted of 13 (of the original 16) young mothers and family members who had been interviewed 4 years earlier. For the present study, data consisted of life history accounts of the intervening 4 years, stories of caregiving routines, and recent coping episodes of parenting elicited through in-depth interviews. Findings offer a situated understanding of young mothering and highlight meaningful distinctions in the ways young mothers experience the self and project themselves into the future. The discovery of patterns and variations in the young mother's sense of self and future have implications for guiding clinical practice and are preliminary to designing programs and interventions that are tailored to the practical understanding and situated possibilities of young mothers.
PIP: The prevailing view that an early pregnancy jeopardizes a young woman's emotional development disregards the social nature of the construction of self and others. Although parenting can be a stressful life experience, it also has the potential to create new ways of coping and to contribute to a revised understanding of the self. For many impoverished African-American teens, with few opportunities to establish an identity through education or a career, motherhood provides the route to adulthood. The present study investigated patterns in young mothers' narratives of self and their visions of the future. In-depth interviews were conducted with 13 US adolescent mothers 4 years after the birth of their first child at an average age of 15.6 years. In the majority of cases, mothering was described as a generally positive experience that engendered a sense of responsibility and supplied a social identity consistent with family and cultural meanings of becoming a woman. The mothers' efforts to become a responsible parent tended to transform their sense of identity and provide a sense of future possibility not previously available. Those who lived in conditions of extreme poverty and danger, without social support, were less able to turn motherhood into an opportunity for reconstruction of the self. Instead, mothering diminished the self and exacerbated feelings of powerlessness, frustration, and conflict. These findings suggest that motherhood is adversely affected by the conditions associated with poverty rather than maternal age per se. Needed, to improve the outcomes of adolescent pregnancy, are interventions that focus on ethical and political questions rather than technical issues.