On the relationship between country sex ratios and teen pregnancy rates: Areplication

The hypothesis that a low ratio of men to women both destabilizes marriages and makes it more Likely that young women will reproduce early outside of marriage was supported by an analysis of 42 societies for which the United Nations published detailed information on population structure and teen chi ldbearing This study attempted to replicate the earlier finding using sex r atios for 0- to 14-year-olds (as a proxy for teen sex ratios) and a larger sample of 185 countries. Several measures of economic development, populati on density, and latitude were used as control variables in, the regression analyses. Teen births were inversely related to the sex ratio, to urbanizat ion, and to Latitude. The sex ratio explained 38% of the variance in teen b irth rates, thus providing a clear replication of the earlier study. Early childbearing can be seen as an adaptive response to poor marital opportunit y.