Mothers' and grandmothers' caregiving for young children in Chile: Roles and responsibilities

Access to Higher Education and Adolescent Fertility in Chile

This study investigates gender differences in the association between adolescent fertility and the likelihood of initiating higher education among young Chilean men and women. We adopt an entropy balancing strategy to estimate the association between adolescent fertility and the likelihood of starting higher education while accounting for potential selection into early childbearing due to socioeconomic status and prior academic achievement. We use data from official national registers that cover a cohort of Chilean students who attended publicly funded schools and who successfully completed secondary schooling between 2011 and 2022. Our results indicate that adolescent mothers are 15 percentage points less likely to initiate higher education than their peers who did not give birth during adolescence. In comparison, teenage fathers are 20 percentage points less likely to do so than their childless counterparts. Our findings stand in contrast to previously identified disadvantage patterns for secondary school completion, whereby adolescent fertility more significantly hinders schooling completion for women relative to men. We contend that this reversal may be related to traditional gender-role expectations in Chile, which encourage young fathers to act as providers and, therefore, may be prevented from continuing on their education path into tertiary studies.

Non-Intrusive Maternal Style as a Mediator between Playfulness and Children’s Development for Low-Income Chilean Adolescent Mothers

The aim of this study was to describe the relationship between low-income Chilean adolescent maternal playfulness and mothers’ non-intrusiveness in their children’s development and to analyze whether a mother’s non-intrusiveness mediates the relationship between maternal playfulness and children’s development. The Parental Playfulness Scale and the Subscale of Intrusiveness from the Early Head Start Research and Evaluation Project were used to assess maternal playfulness and mothers’ non-intrusiveness respectively. Ages and Stages Questionnaire 3rd Edition (ASQ-3) was applied to measure the children’s communication, gross and fine motor skills, problem-solving and personal–social development. The sample consisted of 79 mother–child dyads with children aged 10–24 months (M = 15.5, SD = 4.2) and their mothers aged 15–21 years old (M = 19.1, SD = 1.7). A bivariate analysis showed that maternal playfulness was significantly associated with communication, fine motor, problem-solving and personal–social development. Moreover, higher levels of communication, fine motor skills and problem-solving development were observed in the children of less intrusive mothers. Maternal playfulness had a significant effect on children’s development of language, problem-solving and personal–social skills when their mothers showed less intrusiveness during interaction. These findings contribute to the understanding of the interaction between adolescent mothers and their children. Active play and less intrusiveness can enhance child development.