Addressing Macro Perspectives of Societal Influences in Relation to Teenage Pregnancy by the Professional through the Nursing Profession

ADDRESSING MACRO PRESPECTIVES OF SOCIETIAL INFLUENCES IN RELATION TO TEENAGE PREGNANCY BY THE PROFESSIONAL THROUGH THE NURSING PROFESSION “As your actions are informed by your awareness of values, your thinking and your ideas are shaped and changed by your experiences with those actions (Chinn, 1995, p. 3).” As a nursing professional, addressing the cause and not the symptoms of societal concerns in relation to teenage pregnancy would be the ideal. In order for a profession to evoke transition in this or any aggregate, it is important for that profession to correlate those macro perspectives, which influence poor lifestyle choices and how these choices may be approached in a health promotion perspective. It is the intent of this dissertation to relate current statistical information, some societal factors involved in the increased numbers of teenage pregnancy, and the nursing implications to this issue. Despite education about birth control and the negative connotations in regards to procreation in the adolescent, the number of teenage pregnancies in the United States are very significant. According to the National Campaign to Prevent Teenage Pregnancy that approximately one million teenage girls between the

ages of 15 and 19 get pregnant each year in the United States and that nearly eighty percent (80) of these pregnancies are to unmarried teens. But one should view teenage pregnancy on the macro level. Whatever happened to childhood The problem of teenage pregnancy in the United States. Sandra Hewell and Janet Andrews state that adolescents"tm difficulty in decision making and tend to have a personal fable that protects them from negative events. School nursing is another venue where the community needs should be assessed and addressed. In a study conducted by Cynthia Connelly, she determined that low self-esteem factors were present prior to pregnancy and once the teen became pregnant, self-esteem was heightened (1998). Forth, the issue of relationship pressures may also be looked at from a nursing perspective. According to Nola Pender that health promotion involves strategies related to an individual lifestyle and personal choices made in a social context that have a strong influence over one"tms own health expectations (1996).