Childbearing in Cohabiting Unions: Racial and Ethnic Differences

vs. 61%). Whether or not a woman conceived a child did not affect the mean religiosity of the sample Women who had a child during cohabitation had lower education levels than the entire sample—almost half (46%) had less than 12 years of education, while a quarter of the total sample had not completed 12 years. Women conceiving a child during cohabitation were also less likely than the total sample to be employed fulltime (44% vs. 60%). A greater percentage of the women who already had children went on to conceive a child while cohabiting than the total sample (21% vs. 14%). On average, the women who had a child while cohabiting were slightly younger than the total sample. Finally, women who had a child during cohabitation more often than the total sample started cohabiting prior to 1990. Most women had only one child during cohabitation, but approximately onefifth of women who became mothers while cohabiting gave birth two or more times (not shown). Among women who gave birth during cohabitation, one-third of Hispanic women gave birth to two or more children, while only one-quarter of black women and one-fifth of white women did so. In this article, we can distinguish between women who had children that were born during cohabitation and those who conceived children during cohabitation. This distinction is important because nearly three-fifths (59%) of women who conceived a child during cohabitation went on to give birth to that child during cohabitation (Table 2). Thirty-four percent of the women married before the birth of their child, while only 7% of women separated from their cohabiting partner before their child was born. It is important to distinguish between births and conceptions because potentially different factors may predict whether a woman conceives her child during cohabitation or whether she also gives birth to her child while cohabiting. Furthermore, the family type at birth sharply differs among racial and ethnic groups. The overwhelming majority of Hispanic (69%) and black (77%) women who conceived a child during cohabitation also gave birth during that cohabiting union, while only half of white women did so.