The Rise of Female Heads of Households Among African American Families
This research project will examine the African-American family structure and why there is a steadily increasing amount of female-headed households among African-American families. This research will examine data over a 50-year period. It will be analyzed decennially beginning in 1950 and ending in 2000. Contrary to popular belief, the African-American family was primarily a two-parent, husband-wife, family through slavery and into the mid-twentieth century. However, beginning in 1950 Black marriage rates began a significant decline that has lasted into our own present. Consequently, there has been a sharp increase in female-headed households. This research project will examine labor force participation rates, educational attainment levels for African American men and women, and the incarceration rates and the mental hospital population rates for African American men as factors contributing to the deteriorating marriage rates and rise of female-headed households among African-Americans. This research is based on both qualitative and quantitative data. The qualitative data will be gathered from books and articles that many different scholars have written. Some of the scholars are Herbert Gutman, P.J. Bowman, Andrew Billingsley, M. Belinda Tucker, Claudia Mitchell-Kernan and a host of others. The quantitative data will be gathered from different statistics that are related to marriage rates, educational attainment, incarceration rates and mental hospital populations for African-American males. These statistics will be put together into different tables and graphs to show the negative or positive correlation between the different areas. This research has yielded the following results: as labor force participation rates are rising for African American women their marriage rates are decreasing, as labor force participation rates are falling for African American men their marriage rates are decreasing. Also as the incarcerated population and mental hospital population is rising for African American men their marriage rates are decreasing.
School:
North Central University
Department:
Urban Planning
Research Advisor:
James Anderson
Department of Research Advisor:
Educational Policy Studies
Year of Publication:
2003