Children of immigrants: Racial assortative mating and the transition to adulthood.

Few studies have followed immigrant-origin individuals from adolescence to adulthood or examined their spousal choices. Using longitudinal data from Add Health, we present a life-course model that examines the differences in racial assortative mating between children of immigrants and non-immigrants. The results reveal substantial variation in racial endogamy from generation to generation. Racial endogamy was highest in the third generation, but this is due entirely to high racial endogamy among whites. Out-marriage was most pronounced among first- and second-generation immigrants. Our life-course approach shows that the effects of race and generation on intermarriage were mediated by family background (e.g. language proficiency and residence) and educational attainment (at time of marriage), a finding largely indicative of processes of marital assimilation that unfold over time and generation. Evidence of acculturation and structural assimilation, however, could not fully account for the large, persistent, and uneven effects of race and generation on interracial marriage.

Contraceptive Use in Urban Africa: Examining Trends in Rich-Poor Gaps.

Previous studies have documented significant differences in health and reproductive health outcomes between the poor and nonpoor across various countries in sub-Saharan Africa. However, a number of these studies is dated, and the past decade has witnessed significant shifts in health and reproductive health outcomes in many African countries. Using recent data from the Demographic and Health Surveys, this paper updates and extends the literature by examining patterns in contraceptive practice among poor and nonpoor married women in urban settings in 19 African countries. First, we analyze changes in the rich-poor gaps in modern contraceptive prevalence (mCP) in urban Africa over time. We then determine the public source of the supply of modern contraceptives to the urban poor and how that supply may have changed over a 10-year period. The findings show that, in most Eastern and Southern African countries, previous gaps in mCP between the rich and poor married women have disappeared. Countries in Central and Western Africa, however, continue to have significant gaps in mCP between rich and poor women, with urban poor women experiencing only a modest improvement in mCP over the past decade. This paper contributes to our understanding about sub-regional dynamics in reproductive health outcomes in urban settings in sub-Saharan Africa.