Reflections of Risk: Growing Up Female in Minnesota. A Report on the Health and Well-Being of Adolescent Girls in Minnesota.

The Minnesota Women's Fund. February 1990.

University of Minnesota Children, Youth and Family Consortium. Permission is granted to create and distribute copies of this document for noncommercial purposes provided that the author and CYFC receive acknowledgment and this notice is included.

Acknowledgments

Photographs by Mary Lee Slettehaugh, I-Zone Associates, Minneapolis
Written by Parice Tetlin
Layout and graphics by Tedi Grey Owl, MIGIZI Communications, Minneapolis
Printing by Chippewa Graphics, Inc.

Neither the photographs in this report nor the persons appearing in them are intended to illustrate or imply representation of the findings in this study.

The Minnesota Women's Fund would like to thank the Adolescent Health Program of the University of Minnesota for providing the data for this report, and also for its help and encouragement in putting the report together.

The Minnesota Women's Fund would like to offer special thanks to the members of the report advisory committee for their insight and support:

Bernadette Anderson, YWCA of Minneapolis Metro Youth Services
Lisa Bellanger, Heart of the Earth Survival School
Kenyari Bellfield, Urban Coalition of Minneapolis
Kathy Brothan, Family Tree
Ruth Johnson, Teen Age Medical Service
Linda Harris, University of Minnesota
Catherine Jordan, Private Consultant
Gloria Kumagai, St. Paul Public Schools
Valerie Lee, YWCA of Minneapolis
Marlene Lindquist, West Suburban Teen Clinic
Richard Mammen, Minneapolis Youth Coordinating Board
Cathy Nelson, Fridley School District
Lorena Palm, Land of Lakes Girl Scout Council
Kathleen Powers, Minnesota Women's Fund Board
Beverly Propes, Minneapolis United Way
Michael Resnick, University of Minnesota
Thomas Sawyer, The Bridge for Runaway Youth
Barb Whitmore, Minneapolis Council of Camp Fire

The survey data presented in this report comes from the Adolescent Health Survey, conducted by the Adolescent Health Program of the University of Minnesota in conjunction with the Minnesota Department of Health and the Minnesota Department of Education. The views and opinions expressed in this report, however, are those of the Minnesota Women's Fund and do not necessarily represent those of advisory committee members or the institutions involved in conducting the survey.

This report was supported by funds from the General Mills Foundation, the Ramsey County Medical Society Auxiliary, and the Minnesota Women's Fund.

With the assistance of The National Adolescent Health Resource Center, Division of General Pediatrics and Adolescent Health, University of Minnesota 1313 SE 5th St., #205, Minneapolis, MN 55414, Tel: 612-627-4488 Fax: 612-627-4487

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. Introduction

II. Gender Comparisons of Survey Data
Comparisons of Demographics Factors
Comparisons of Social Experience Factors Comparisons of Risk Factors

III. Associations Between Risk and Life Experiences Emotional Stress
Physical and Sexual Abuse
Negative Body Image
Disordered Eating
Suicide
Pregnancy Risk

IV. Risk and Life Experience Clusters

V. The Role of Society: Conclusions and Recommendations Appendix
Footnotes

I. INTRODUCTION

Many adults remember their adolescence as a carefree period, a time of growth and change and experimentation removed from the challenges and dangers of "the real world." That innocent view of life comes, in part, from a human tendency to forget the bad times and dwell on rose-colored memories of the past. It also comes, in part, from reality. Life was different for many young people in days past. The pressures adolescents are under and the problems they face have both changed and intensified.

Youths today are bombarded by conflicting messages in an increasingly technological, consumer-oriented society; kids are expected to process, sort, and deal with these messages, often without much guidance from adults who seem just as bewildered by the quickening pace of life. Young people are also facing a whole set of new dangers, from designer drugs to nuclear war, that past generations did not have to face.

Thirty years ago, most adolescent deaths resulted from communicable diseases. Today, three-quarters of all adolescent deaths are caused by accidents, homicide, and suicide. This shift in the cause of death has occurred without a reduction in the overall mortality rate for youths; the percentage of young people who die is the same. The reason they die is what has changed.

Our society wants the best for its young people. We would like adolescents to have the opportunity to learn and explore, to have a smooth and happy transition from childhood to adulthood, and to grow up to be self-sufficient and successful. But many youths never get that chance. For young people growing up today, adolescence often is a time fraught with anxiety, distress, and some very real perils.

Results of the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey show that a large proportion of young people are at high risk for emotional, social, and health-related problems, ranging from alcohol and drug abuse to problems with premature pregnancy and suicide. In many ways, girls are having an especially rough time. They appear to be under more stress than boys, and to deal with the problems they face by turning them inward. Girls tend to self-destruct. And because they usually do not act out their troubles, as boys do, they often don't get the attention they need when they're hurting. Girls' troubles seem easier to ignore.

What many girls have said through the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey is that, for them, adolescence is a highly stressful time. They say they are under intense pressure to live up to social expectations of how they should look and act. Many don't like their bodies or themselves and will risk their health for the sake of beauty. A disturbing number have also said that they have been physically or sexually abused, and that they think seriously about committing suicide or have already attempted it.

Although validity checks were built in to the survey, including questions intended to detect misleading or inaccurate answers, the factors measured are based on the students' self-reported behaviors and experiences. We don't know whether some of the differences noted here are due to, perhaps, the willingness of girls or boys to admit to only certain kinds of feelings or acts. For example, the statistics indicating that girls experience higher levels of stress could be influenced by the fact that girls may be more willing to say they are under stress, whereas boys are brought up to "keep a stiff upper lip." The statistics on abuse may be influenced by boys' conscious or unconscious reluctance to identify themselves as victims.

We do know, however, that the results of this survey are validated by other research that shows girls have severe problems with emotional stress, negative body image, abuse, disordered eating and suicide. We also know that these same problems plague adult women. This research documents that these feelings and behaviors take root very early in the life of an adolescent. It appears that by the time they are in junior high, young women have already internalized society's negative sex-role stereotypes, and are acting in accordance with them.

This grim picture is not the one most adults want to see for the young women in this society. Adolescent girls should have the opportunity to learn and explore in an environment that allows them to grow, rather than one that constrains them. Girls should feel valued for who they are, rather than what they look like. And they should have the feeling that their needs, concerns, and opinions are important, that they are being heard, and that people are willing to work to make life better for them.

Report Goals

This report is intended to help change the picture for girls, and make it into one that is hopeful and positive. The Minnesota Women's Fund's goal in releasing this report is to help remove the conditions in society that keep young women from living full, happy lives, and prevent them from growing into self-sufficient, contributing adults.

Comprehensive studies of the particular problems girls face are scarce. Many reports dealing with risks and adolescence either talk about all adolescents, or focus on boys. And many of the educational and social programs directed toward making changes in the lives of females deal with adult women, not girls, even though many of the problems women face have their roots in girlhood.

People who interact with adolescents--teachers, social service providers, parents, clergypeople, and others--are in a position to help remove the social barriers that stand in the way of adolescent girls. But, before beginning that work, it's necessary to understand how the problems of young girls differ from those of boys, and how socialization and sex-roll stereotyping may relate to those problems.

This report is intended to aid that understanding by explaining:

The kinds of social, emotional, and physical problems that pose particular threats to young women.
The ways in which these factors disproportionately affect certain groups of girls.
The qualities, circumstances or back ground factors that seem to lower risk levels for young women.
The ways in which socialization and sex-role stereotyping creates problems for girls, and how girls respond to those problems.

This report also provides suggestions for removing the barriers that stand in the way of today's young women.

The needs, concerns, and problems girls face must be heard and really listened to, in order for life to get better for girls. Through this report, the Women's Fund hopes to focus attention on the risks that girls face. The Minnesota Women's Fund hopes to start people thinking about these problems, talking about the role social expectations play in creating these problems, and looking for solutions that address the problems on a systematic, societal level rather than on an individual or personal one.

Report Background

The data presented in this report is based on the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey, conducted by The Adolescent Health Program of the University of Minnesota, in conjunction with the Minnesota Department of Health and the Minnesota Department of Education.

Over 36,000 public school students in grades 7 through 12 participated in the survey during the 1986-87 school year. The survey covered 86 school districts statewide.

The survey was developed by a team of adolescent health researchers, educators, health professionals, and social scientists from Minnesota and across the country; it contained questions about, for example, students' home life, their interaction with parents and peers, their performance in school, their levels of stress, their self-esteem and body image, their use of drugs, whether they had ever attempted suicide, and whether they had ever been physically or sexually abused.

The Minnesota Women's Fund commissioned the University of Minnesota to break out the data for girls and compare it to that of boys. The Urban Coalition of Minneapolis has commissioned a similar analysis, based on race rather than gender. The results of that analysis are available in a report released by the Coalition, entitled The Next Generation: The Health and Well-Being of Young People of Color in the Twin Cities.

This report is divided into four major sections. Section I looks at the differences between young women and men in the survey sample, their demographic backgrounds and social experiences, and the extent to which they are at risk for social, emotional, and health problems. Section II discusses the ways in which demographics and social experiences are related to risks. Section III analyzes the way risks tend to cluster together and explains which life experiences seem to be associated with lower levels of risk. Section IV discusses how these risks may be related to socialization and sex-role stereotyping, and outlines ways that people who work with adolescents can recognize and begin to deal with the factors that put girls at risk in this society. The Appendix to this report explains the survey methodology and the sample design.

The italicized quotes that appear throughout the report come from interviews conducted with three groups of young women in Minnesota. Each group consisted of about a half-dozen people. One group was from a Twin Cities urban junior high, one was from a suburban high school, and one was made up of girls from small towns and rural areas in central Minnesota.

II. GENDER COMPARISONS OF SURVEY DATA

"I Really don't like the way I look that much. . . you look at yourself and its like, "Gosh, look at me, I am so ugly."

The results of the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey showed that, although the households in which they grow up are similar, adolescent girls and boys tend to experience the world differently. They also differ in the extent to which they are at risk for certain social, emotional, and health problems.

One of the most disturbing findings from this survey is that a much greater percentage of girls than boys indicated that they have been physically and/or sexually abused by someone in their lives. More girls than boys said they feel alienated or disconnected from their families, and that they rely on their friends rather than on their parents for support, validation, and advice--if they rely on any one.

The survey shows that the way girls tend to deal with their problems is to internalize them, rather than act them out as boys do. Girls indicated that they experience higher levels of stress than boys, and that they have poorer body-image and self-esteem. More girls than boys reported having disordered eating symptoms and having attempted to commit suicide.*

One of the ironies about the kinds of problems girls face is that these problems often go unheeded by people in a position to help, because their problems tend to be quiet ones that don't directly affect other people. Also, because many girls feel they can't turn to adults for assistance, adults often don't learn the extent to which girls feel distressed.

This section discusses the differences and similarities between girls and boys in their demographic backgrounds, in their social experiences, and in the risks to which they are exposed. (For ease of comparison, the statistics presented in this report have been rounded off to the nearest whole number.)

Please note that, for the most part, this report does not look at differences and similarities on the basis of race. A few of the associations between life experience and risk were analyzed by race, but the major emphasis here is on gender. The Urban Coalition of Minneapolis has released a report entitled The Next Generation: The Health and Well-Being of Young People of Color in the Twin Cities, which looks at racial differences in students' responses to the Adolescent Health Survey.

(*) The Minnesota Student Survey, conducted in 1989 by the Minnesota Department of Education, confirms many of the findings of the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey. In their responses to that survey, a proportionately larger number of girls than boys said that they have been physically and/or sexually abused, that they don't like themselves or their bodies, that they feel they are overweight, that they feel emotionally stressed, and that they have tried or would like to try to kill themselves.

The Minnesota Student Survey questioned more than 90,000 students from almost all of the school districts in Minnesota. A gender analysis of correlations has not been done on the raw survey data, but the basic findings were remarkably similar. The results of this survey not only validate the findings revealed in this report, but also show that things haven't gotten any better in the three years since the Adolescent Health Survey was administered.

Gender Comparisons of Demographic Factors

The questions in this category dealt with the students, individual and family backgrounds, and included race ethnicity, type of community, family structure, parental socioeconomic status, and family stress level. Analysis of the data showed few differences between the young females and young males in the survey sample for any of the demographic factors measured. While there are differences among the environments in which various groups of adolescents grow up, these differences are not gender based.

Racial/ethnic breakdowns for female and male respondents were very similar. Ninety-four percent of respondents of both sexes classified themselves as white, just over two per cent as African American, just under two percent as Asian, around one per cent as American Indian, and less than one percent as Hispanic. (This racial breakdown represents the statewide average.)

Family structure and family stress levels were similar for both sexes as well. Approximately eight out of ten adolescents said they live in two parent households, about 14 percent said their household was headed by a single parent, and around three per cent said they live in alternative household arrangements (labeled simply "other" in the survey)--for example, with foster parents, with other relatives, or with unrelated individuals. Just under 18 percent of females and males said that the family they live in is under a high level of stress.

Only slight differences in socioeconomic status and geographic location exist between girls and boys; overall, girls and boys come from fairly similar backgrounds: Thirteen percent of all females indicated that they come from lower-income families, compared with 11 percent of males. It should be noted that economic classifications were made based on students' report of parental education levels and employment status; therefore, these measures may be imperfect.

Thirty-four percent of males and 31 percent of females said they live in suburban areas, 19 percent of females and 16 percent of males in small towns, ten percent of both groups in urban areas; and 30 percent of both groups live in rural areas.

Demographic Factors:

Race or Ethnicity: Asian or Pacific Islander, American Indian or Alaskan Native, Hispanic origin, African-American, or White.

Type of Community: urban, suburban, small town, or rural.

Family Structure: one-parent family, two-parent family, or 'other' family arrangements, such as being placed in a foster home, or living with relatives other than parents.

Parental Socioeconomic Status: a combined rating of parents' education level and employment status.

Family Stress Level: the amount of stress the student's family experienced in the previous year.

Gender Comparisons of Social Experience Factors

Results from the survey showed that girls tend to differ from boys somewhat in the way they see and react to the world, that is, in their social experiences. The questions in this category dealt with these social experiences, and included items about performance in school, absenteeism, feelings of "connectedness" to family, dependence on parents and peers for help and support, and religiousness.

Girls tend to see themselves as doing better in school than boys do. Although school performance decreases with age for both females and males, slightly more girls than boys in both age groups said they see themselves as doing well in school (see Chart 1). A higher percentage of junior high and senior high females rated themselves "above average" or "much above average," than did junior high and senior high males. Conversely, more males than females in both age groups rated themselves as "much below average."

On the other hand, girls, especially older ones, tend to feel more alienated from their families than do boys. The percentage of students who say they feel connected to their families decreases with age for both male and female adolescents: About twice as many senior high students reported low or very low levels of family connectedness as did junior high students (Chart 2). Conversely, about three times as many junior high students rated their level of family connectedness as high. A slightly higher percentage of girls than boys in both age groups indicated that their feelings of connection to their families are low or very low.

Although all adolescents rely less on their parents and more on their peers as they get older, girls tend to be more peer dependent than are boys of the same age (Chart 3). A higher percentage of junior high and senior high girls said they'd turn first to their peers for help and emotional support than did junior high and senior high boys. Conversely, a higher percentage of junior high and senior high boys said they would turn first to their parents for help with their problems than did junior and senior high girls.

Some of these differences in social experience, however, are related even more to age than to gender. Feelings of religiousness, for example, decrease somewhat as adolescents grow older. About a quarter of all students indicated that they have a low level of religiousness; that is, they identify themselves as religious "not at all," or "only a little" (Chart 4). At the other end of the spectrum are students who indicated they are "highly religious." These students identify themselves as religious, believe their church leaders care about them, and would turn to their church leaders for help with their problems.

Absenteeism tends to increase as adolescents get older. About one in six adolescents in junior high said they skipped school or classes at least once. Among senior high students, more than twice that number had skipped one or more times (Chart 5).

Social Experience Factors

Academic Performance: students' perception of their work in school and self-reported grades.
Absenteeism: the number of times students said they skipped classes or school.
Family Connectedness: the extent to which a student feels emotionally connected to her family members, and feels that her family cares about her.
Parental and Peer Dependence: the extent to which students rely on parents or on peers for help with problems. Religiousness: the extent to which students said they labeled themselves "religious," the intensity of their religious feelings and the extent to which they see themselves as part of a religious community.

Gender Comparisons of Risk Factors

Adolescent girls and boys differ in the degree to which they are at risk for certain social, emotional and health problems. Adolescent girls tend to have "quiet" problems, problems that are self-destructive, or that aren't directed at other people. More girls than boys say that they are subjected to sexual and physical abuse, that they are under emotional stress, that they have poor body images and self-images, that they have symptoms of disordered eating, and that they have attempted to commit suicide.

Adolescent boys, on the other hand, tend to "act out" their problems. More boys than girls say that they have committed delinquent acts, have taken physical risks, have engaged in frequent and unprotected sex, and have consumed large quantities of alcohol and other drugs.

Although the statistics relating to each of these risks comes from the adolescents' reports of their own behavior, the kinds of risk adolescents say they face most are consistent with data from other studies. The questions in this category dealt with the experiences and behaviors that put adolescents at risk for physical, emotional, or social problems.

According to the results of the survey, the factors for which girls are most at risk are emotional stress, physical and sexual abuse, negative body image, disordered eating, and suicide. The factors for which boys are most at risk are alcohol use, poly-drug use, accidental injury, and delinquency. The risk of premature parenthood, based on frequency of sex and use of birth control, was also measured in the survey. That risk is statistically higher for males than females because males are more likely to engage in behavior leading to pregnancy. However, premature parenthood poses more problems for girls than it does for boys. It is misleading to discuss pregnancy as a "male" risk; therefore pregnancy is included as a risk for girls.

This breakdown is not intended to imply that the "quiet" or inner-directed problems are the only ones girls face. Young girls also are susceptible to the dangers of substance abuse, physical risk-taking, and anti-social behaviors. They, as well as boys, may "act out." Research shows that acting out behavior in girls is more common among some racial and ethnic groups than others. For these young women, acting out presents additional health and social risks; the presence of such behavior does not preclude either self-destructive acts and attitudes or the often-silenced menace of physical and sexual abuse. Additional research into the interaction between quietly disturbed and acting out behaviors for young women is needed.

Risk Factors for Girls

Emotional Stress: a combined rating of adolescents' self-reported feelings about their stress, based on their responses to a variety of statements about their feelings. Students who scored high on the emotional stress scale reported the greatest levels of anxiety, depressions, nervousness, hopelessness, sadness, exhaustion, and emotional insecurity.

Physical and Sexual Abuse: measured by adolescents' responses to questions about whether anyone--family members or "anyone else"-- had ever abused them physically or sexually. The survey did not ask specific questions about the type of abuse or the person who was the abuser. The answers may, therefore, be subjective, but do reflect the adolescents' perceptions of having been abused.

Negative Body Image: measured as the extent to which adolescents like their bodies, worry about their appearance, and feel their weight is what it should be.

Disordered Eating Risk: measured as the number of disordered eating symptoms, such as overeating in combination with self-induced vomiting, or excessive dieting. Included in this measure was the likelihood of developing these symptoms based on attitudes such as negative body image and feelings of being overweight. Adolescents in the highest risk categories either had a strong predisposition toward developing problems based on their attitudes and perceptions or they were dieting or bingeing and purging regularly.

Suicide Risk: measured as the likelihood that an adolescent will attempt to commit suicide, based on previous attempts and the severity of current suicidal thoughts. Adolescents in the highest risk category said they had attempted suicide in the previous six months and/or said they would kill themselves if they had the chance.

Pregnancy Risk: measured as the likelihood of getting pregnant (for females) or of getting someone pregnant (for mates), based on a combination of factors that included reported frequency of sexual activity and of proper birth control use. Adolescents in the highest risk categories said they have sex frequently and never or almost never use birth control. Adolescents in the lowest risk category said they have not yet had sex. Other risk categories cover a range of adolescents, from those who have sex frequently, but always use birth control to those who have sex rarely but never use birth control.

Risk Factors for Boys

Alcohol Use: measured as adolescents' self-reported drinking habits. Adolescents at high risk drank more often and/or consumes a greater amount of alcohol than did adolescents at lower risk levels. Adolescents at very high risk said either they drank daily or they drank at least six drinks at a time once a month or more.

Poly-Drug Use: measured as adolescents' self-reported, regular use of more than one chemical, including alcohol but excluding tobacco. Alcohol and marijuana were the most commonly cited chemicals measured by this scale.

Accidental Injury: measured as the extent to which the adolescent engages in behaviors or activities commonly associated with accidents for young people, including driving under the influence of chemicals or with drivers who are, riding motorcycles, and fighting.

Delinquency: measured as the extent to which adolescents engage in a variety of "deviant" acts, including shoplifting, vandalism, assault, and group fighting.

"I do have a negative body image. I'm constantly dieting. Last year, I was in a period where I didn't eat much at all. I lost weight, you gain it back, and you're depressed 'cause you gained it back..."

Risk Factors for Girls

Close to twice as many females in both age groups indicated that they are at high or very high levels of stress as did males (Chart 6): one quarter of junior high and more than a third of senior high females fall into the highest stress categories, compared with 13 percent of junior high and 20 percent of senior high males. As Chart 7 shows, a higher percentage of girls than boys gave the most negative responses to each of a variety of statements measuring stress. For example, one in three girls said they are under "extreme" emotional strain, compared with one in four boys.

Four times as many girls reported abuse as did boys (Chart 8). About 15 percent of junior high and nearly a quarter of senior high girls said that someone in their lives had abused them physically, sexually, or both. The figures for boys are much lower: Four percent of junior high and six percent of senior high boys reported abuse, most of it physical.

Almost three times as many girls in both age groups said they have a negative body image as did boys: 30 percent of junior high and 40 percent of senior-high females view their bodies negatively, compared with 12 per cent of junior and 15 percent of senior high males (Chart 9). And a higher percentage of young women indicated that they worry about the way they look. As Chart 10 shows, 64 percent of girls, compared with 40 percent of boys, said they worry about their appearance "quite a bit" or "very much."

A girl with a negative body image is more likely than a boy with one not only to say she feels badly about herself but also to believe that others see her in a negative light. More than three times as many girls with a negative body image indicated they feel badly about themselves as did boys with a negative body image.* Approximately the same proportion said they thought that others felt negatively about them as well (see Charts 11 and 12). It is ironic that even if a girl has a positive body image, she is still less likely than a boy to say she feels good about herself or to believe that others think highly of her.

(*) Please note that, because of survey limitations, the statistics for body-image as compared to self-image are from the non-urban population only.

And whether their actual weight is under, at, or above normal (based on average weight tables for reported height), girls are more likely than boys to say they are overweight (Chart 13). Sixty-five percent of underweight girls said they see themselves as either "about right" or as overweight, compared to about half of underweight boys. Of adolescents whose weight is average, more than three times as many girls said they think they are overweight as did boys.

Given the tendency of young women to dislike their bodies and to base their self-worth, in part, on their body image, it is not surprising that many more adolescent females are at high or very high risk for disordered eating than are their male classmates. As Chart 14 shows, compared with boys their own age, five times as many junior high girls (10 percent) and nine times as many senior high girls (18 percent) fall into the highest risk categories for disordered eating. And another one-and-a-half to two times as many girls fall into the moderate risk category.

About 10 percent of junior high and 16 percent of senior high females said they had gone on 10 or more diets in the previous year. Almost a third of all females reported having had episodes of overeating followed by vomiting. Fourteen percent said that they vomit after eating at least once a month.

A higher percentage of adolescent girls reported having attempted to commit suicide than did adolescent boys, although boys tend to use more lethal methods when they attempt to commit suicide and are therefore more "successful" in their attempts. As Chart 15 shows, young women in grades 7 through 12 are much more likely than boys to attempt suicide. Of all 12th grade students, almost twice as many females (18 percent) indicated that they had attempted suicide at least once as did males (nine percent).

And girls who have tried once to kill themselves are more likely than such boys to say they think seriously about trying again (Chart 16). Some studies show that between 40 and 50 percent of adolescents who commit suicide have made a previous suicide attempt. Adolescent females in both junior and senior high are at a greater risk than males for future suicide attempts: One in ten young women fall into the highest risk category (Chart 17).

Boys are, statistically speaking, somewhat more likely than females to be moderate to high risk for pregnancy. That is, they are more likely to engage in frequent, unprotected sex, and risk getting someone pregnant. As Chart 18 shows, four percent of junior high and 14 percent of senior high boys fell into the high risk category for pregnancy, compared with three percent of junior high and 11 percent of senior high girls. This figure is misleading, however, because "pregnancy risk" for a boy really translates into a greater problem for the girl involved. Girls are the ones who bear the primary emotional, social, and financial burdens for an unwanted pregnancy, both at the time they get pregnant and in the future. Studies show that each year, about ten percent of all adolescent females become pregnant.

Chart 19 shows the percentage of female and male adolescents who have had intercourse, by grade level. Nationwide, the average age of first intercourse for all adolescents who have had intercourse is about 15 years old. In Minnesota, the average age is about 14 for boys and a half-year older for girls. National studies show that 50 percent of all teen pregnancies occur within six months after an adolescent first has intercourse.

Although more than half of junior high students who have had sex said they do so rarely, about half also said they don't always use birth control. Among junior high students, 34 percent of girls and 24 percent of boys indicated that they don't use birth control at all. Twice as many senior high students report using some form of birth control; however, senior high students also have sex more frequently than do younger adolescents, and so are more likely to be in the higher risk categories for pregnancy.

"If you're kind of fat, you know, then the guys really don't like you and they make fun of you all the time; so a lot of girls just go in the bathroom every time after lunch and you can kind of tell that there's something wrong."

Risks Factors for Boys

"I was raised a little different. I think my parents wanted a boy, so I was raised a little more leniently. . ."

Boys in both age groups are more likely than girls to drink, especially to excess; senior high males are the most likely of all to fall into the highest risk category for problem drinking: Thirty-nine percent of senior high males are at very high risk for developing alcohol problems compared to 25 percent of senior high females (Chart 20).

Chemical use increases with age for all adolescents, but increases to a greater extent for males: Older boys are somewhat more likely to use one or more chemicals than are their female counterparts. Forty-six percent of females and 52 percent of males in senior high said they use at least one chemical regularly (Chart 21), compared with 17 percent of females and 16 percent of males in junior high. Eleven percent of females and 14 percent of males in senior high use more than one chemical regularly, compared with about three percent of both girls and boys in junior high.

Although risk of accidental injury also increases with age, boys age groups are more likely than girls to fall into the highest risk categories. As Chart 22 shows, nine percent of junior high males and 27 percent of senior high males are at high risk for accidental injury, compared with five percent of junior high and 17 percent of senior high girls.

Delinquency, however, doesn't follow quite the same pattern. Although it increases with age for boys, it actually decreases for older girls. As Chart 23 shows, six percent of females and 11 percent of males in junior high reported that they have committed "many deviant acts," compared with 13 percent of males and only three per cent of females in senior high.

III. ASSOCIATIONS BETWEEN RISK & LIFE EXPERIENCES

"I can talk to my mom. I don't like to talk to her about drugs and sex, but I can talk to her about anything else."

Certain life experiences are associated with higher levels of risk for young women and men. Some adolescents, such as those who are doing poorly in school or those who feel alienated from their parents, are more likely than others to have social, emotional, and health problems.

Although the kinds of experiences associated with risks are similar for all adolescents, some of the associations are stronger for females than they are for males. Girls who have had certain experiences are even more likely than such boys to be at high risk for particular problems. The kinds of demographic and social factors that are most often associated with risks included poor performance in school and low levels of family connectedness.

Alternative family structure is another factor strongly associated with most of the risks discussed. Although the percentage of at-risk adolescents from alternative families is high, however, the actual number of adolescents who live in such families is small, representing only about three percent of the total group surveyed.*

Although higher levels of risk are associated with particular factors, that doesn't mean the factors are necessarily causing those problems; there may be other kinds of relationships involved. Still, the associations can help to identify the kinds of background and social experience factors that may point to the presence of problems. Being aware of the associations can help teachers, parents, and other concerned people learn which girls are most likely to be in trouble. This awareness seems especially important for people dealing with adolescent girls, since girls tend to have the type of quiet problems that can easily go unnoticed. Knowing about the associations can also help people who work with adolescent girls to start thinking about the ways to help lower risk levels for girls.

The major emphasis of this report is on gender, but a few of the risks that pose particular problems for young women were analyzed on the basis of race. Results also from the survey show that adolescents from different racial and ethnic groups are more likely than others to face certain risks. Gender differences, however, were usually as strong as racial or ethnic ones. Some groups of girls appear to be at higher risk than others when we look at the problems adolescent females are having but girls in any given racial or ethnic group appear to be at higher risk than the boys in the same group.

This section discusses the factors associated with the risks that pose the greatest problems for young women: emotional stress, physical and sexual abuse, negative body image, disordered eating, suicide, and pregnancy.

(*) The percentage of adolescents living in alternative families differs among racial and ethnic groups; the report by the Urban Coalition of Minneapolis discusses these differences in greater detail.

Emotional Stress
"Sometimes, I just go to my room and cry it out; other times, I just sit there and act like it didn't happen."

As discussed earlier, the term "emotional stress" covers a wide range of negative feelings from strain to sadness. Adolescents at the highest levels of emotional stress reported the greatest levels of anxiety, depression, nervousness, hopelessness, sadness, exhaustion, and emotional insecurity.

More young women say they feel highly stressed than do young men: more than one in three senior high girls fall into the highest stress categories, compared with one in five senior high boys. In fact, a higher percentage of girls than boys fall into the highest stress categories whichever demographic and social experience breakdown we look at.*

Emotional stress is strongly associated with low levels of family connectedness for both girls and boys. As Chart 24 shows, more than three times as many young women and four times as many young men who said they feel alienated from their families are at high or very high levels of stress as are adolescents who said they are very connected to their families.

Emotional stress is associated with low levels of religiousness for girls, but not boys. Young women who said they are not religious are almost twice as likely as young women with strong religious feeling to say they have high levels of emotional stress (Chart 25). Boys' emotional stress levels appear to remain fairly constant, whether their religious feelings are strong or weak.

For girls, emotional stress is associated, although less strongly, with alternative family structure. A higher percentage of females from alternative families reported that they are at high or very high levels of emotional stress than did females in single- and two-parent families. Boys' emotional stress levels remain fairly constant whatever type of family they live in (Chart 26).

For both males and females, emotional stress is associated, but less strongly, with dependence on peers rather than parents, and with high levels of family stress. Adolescents who depend mainly on their peers are more likely to be stressed out than those who depend mainly on their parents; adolescents who depend on neither are twice as likely to have high stress levels (Chart 27). Of those youth who said they depend on neither parents nor peers, half of the females and more than a quarter of the males fell into the highest stress category.

A larger proportion of adolescents from high-stress families indicated that they feel high or very high levels of emotional stress than did adolescents from low-stress families (Chart 28).

A higher percentage of adolescents from some racial and ethnic groups indicate they experience high stress levels than do adolescents from other groups: As Chart 29 shows, a larger proportion of Hispanic females indicated they felt highly stressed than did other females; next were white and Asian females. A lower percentage of African-American and American Indian females reported high stress levels. Of the males, a higher percentage of Hispanics reported being highly stressed than did males from other racial or ethnic groups, but this percentage is still lower than that for any group of females. Within each racial or ethnic group, one-and-a-half to two times as many girls are at high levels of stress.

There appears to be no association between emotional stress and parental socio-economic status for any adolescents. As Chart 30 shows, stress levels for both females and mates seem to be constant across each socioeconomic stratum.

(*) Because of survey limitations, figures for emotional stress represent the urban population only.

Physical and Sexual Abuse

Reliable statistics on abuse are hard to come by and are even harder to interpret. A growing awareness of what constitutes abuse and changing ideas about the absolute sanctity of the family make abuse a difficult subject to deal with. It is hard to be sure whether the increase in the number of abuse cases is due to an actual increase in abuse, to better awareness and reporting of abuse, or both. But, whether the percentages have increased, the number of adolescents being abused remains high.

Because these statistics represent the adolescents' report of abuse, rather than documented cases of abuse, we don't know whether some of the differences noted here are due to, perhaps, the willingness of girls or boys to admit to only certain kinds of feelings or acts. Additional research is needed to determine the relationship between reported and actual abuse. Many social scientists believe the figures are severely under-inflated.

We do know that the trends for girls that are documented in this report mirror reality for many adult women. Data from the social service sector shows that many more women than men are abused. Data from the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey shows that problems with abuse appear to begin early and to affect girls more often than boys.

A higher percentage of girls than boys indicated having been abused whichever demographic and social experience breakdown we look at. In no case did more than 13 percent of any group of boys report having been abused. That was the highest figure, even among the boys who had the experiences with which abuse is most strongly associated. The figures for girls were much higher across the board, and reached 40 to 50 percent among some groups of girls.

It should be reiterated that the survey asked only whether abuse had ever occurred; it did not ask who had been the abuser. There is no way of knowing, from this survey, whether an adolescent was abused by a parent, by some other relative, by a friend, acquaintance, or "authority figure," or by a stranger. Because we don't know who abused the adolescents or when the abuse occurred, we can't infer any causality based on any of the demographic or social experience factors. If, for example, a higher percentage of girls from alternative families report abuse, it does not mean that the abuse necessarily occurs within those kinds of families, although this is a possibility. It may be that some or many of these girls have been removed from abusive homes and placed in the care of other individuals.

Physical and sexual abuse are strongly associated with poor performance in school, low levels of family connectedness, alternative family structure, and lower parental socioeconomic status for both females and males. As Chart 31 shows, of girls who said their performance in school is very poor, almost half--45 percent--said that they have been abused, compared to about 11 percent of the boys whose performance is very poor. These percentages are about three times greater than those for adolescents who said they do very well in school.

About four times as many adolescents who rated their level of family connectedness as "very low," said that they have been abused as did adolescents who rated their level of family connectedness as "high" (Chart 32).

Reports of abuse are also more common among adolescents from single-parent families than those from two-parent families, and are about three times as likely to come from adolescents in native families, as Chart 33 shows. Of adolescents living in alternative families more than half of the girls and about 12 percent of the boys reported abuse.

About twice as many adolescents from lower socioeconomic status families said they had been abused as did adolescents from middle- or upper-income families (Chart 34).

A larger proportion of adolescents from certain racial and ethnic groups reported having been abused than did adolescents from other groups. Chart 35 shows the percentage of students from each race who said they have been abused physically, sexually, or both. Twice as many American Indian females reported abuse as did Asian females. Percentages for African-American, Hispanic and white females were somewhere in between. More than twice as many American Indian males reported abuse as did Asian or Asian or white males. In each racial or ethnic group, however, between two and four times as many girls as boys reported having been abused.

Abuse is also associated with higher levels of family stress for girls, but not for boys. Among girls, almost twice as many from high stress families said that they had been abused as did those from low stress families (Chart 36).

Negative Body Image

Negative body image is much more common among young women than among young men. And although negative body image is associated with certain demographic and social experience factors for males as well as females, the associations for males aren't nearly as strong. No matter what breakdown we look at, an overwhelming majority of young men said they have "somewhat positive" or "very positive" images of their bodies, while up to half the young women have negative body images.

Negative body image is strongly associated with low levels of family connectedness, especially for girls. As shown in Chart 37, twice as many girls whose level of connection to their families is low said they have a negative body image as did young women who are highly connected to their families. Even girls who are highly connected to their families, however, are much less likely than such boys to have a positive body image.

Negative body image is strongly associated with poor performance in school for girls, but is only weakly associated for boys. As Chart 38 shows, about twice as many girls whose self-reported level in school is "much below average" said they have a negative body image as did girls who reported they do very well. Among boys, the percentage who had a negative body image was only slightly higher for those who did poorly in school.

However, for the vast majority of young women, doing very well in school is not necessarily associated with having a positive body image. Of those adolescents who said their work in school is "much above average," a lower percentage of girls than boys said their body image is "very positive."

Negative body image is weakly associated with alternative family structure for girls, but not associated at all for boys. Young women from single-parent and alternative families than are young women from two-parent families (Chart 39).

Negative body image was weakly associated with low levels of religiousness for both girls and boys. Among all adolescents, a slightly higher percent of those whose religious connection was "very low" had a negative body image than did those whose religious connection was "high." A much higher percentage of girls in each group had a negative body image than did boys (Chart 40).

A larger proportion of adolescents from certain racial and ethnic groups indicated they had a negative body image than did adolescents from other groups. A higher percentage of American Indian and Hispanic females said they have negative body images than did other females (Chart 41); a lower percentage of Asian and African-American females said they have a negative body image. White females fell somewhere in the middle. More American Indian males indicated that they have a negative body image than did any other males; that percentage, however, was still lower than for any group of females. In each racial or ethnic group, at least twice as many girls had negative body images as did boys in the same group.

Young women from lower socioeconomic families were a little more likely to have indicated that they view their bodies negatively than were young women from upper socioeconomic families. Likewise, young women from high stress families were a little more likely to have a negative body image than were young women from low stress families. See Chart 42.

Disordered Eating

Given the tendency of girls to believe they are overweight, to feel negatively about themselves and their bodies, and to think that other people view them in a negative way, it isn't surprising that girls are at much higher risk for disordered eating than are boys. More than half of junior high and almost two-thirds of senior high females are at moderate to high risk for disordered eating, compared with about a third of the boys in both age groups. Five times as many girls at the junior high level (ten percent compared with two percent for boys) and nine times as many girls at the senior high level (18% compared with two percent for boys) are at high or very high risk for disordered eating.

Adolescents in the highest risk categories either had a strong predisposition towards developing problems based on their attitudes and perceptions, or were engaged in excessive dieting or regular bingeing and purging.

Comparisons between boys and girls are difficult to make because so few boys fell into the highest categories: overall, only two percent of all males are at high or very high risk for disordered eating, and there was not breakdown in which more than six percent of the males were at high or very high risk. Conversely, there was no breakdown in which fewer than 10 percent of the females were at high or very high risk, with the exception of those young women who said they did not care very much about their appearance, a group that is a definite minority among females. Among some groups of adolescents, such as those who feel alienated from their families, one in four young women were at high or very high risk for disordered eating.

For girls, disordered eating was strongly associated with low levels of family connectedness, worry over appearance, poor performance in school, and alternative family structure.

More than twice as many girls who rate their level of family connectedness as very low are at high or very high risk for disordered eating as are girls who said they are highly connected to their families (Chart 43).

About three times as many girls who worry about their appearance-- and the majority say they do--are in the higher risk categories for disordered eating, as are girls who say they don't worry about their appearance (Chart 44).

Although disordered eating is thought to predominate among "high achievers," about twice as many girls who don't do well in school actually are at higher risk, as Chart 45 shows.

A higher percentage of young women living in alternative families fall into the highest risk categories than do young women in either one-parent or two-parent households (Chart 46).

Disordered eating was less strongly associated with family stress. Young women from high-stress families are somewhat more likely than young women from low-stress families to be at high risk for disordered eating. As Chart 47 shows, a somewhat smaller percentage of girls from low-stress families are at high or very high risk for disordered eating than are girls from high-stress families.

A larger proportion of adolescents from certain racial and ethnic groups are at high risk for disordered eating than are adolescents from other groups; the pattern is slightly different for girls than it is for boys. Among females, the group with the highest percentage at risk for disordered eating is Asians; the group with the lowest percentage is African Americans. Among males, the group with the highest percentage at high risk is American Indians; the groups with the lowest percentages are African Americans and whites. Chart 48 shows the percentages of each of the groups at high or very high risk for disordered eating. Within each racial or ethnic group, the percentage of young women at high risk is three to seven times higher than for young men.

Although disordered eating is often thought to be more common among wealthy females, there does not appear to be any association with socioeconomic status. As Chart 49 shows, the percentage of females at high or very high risk for disordered eating is similar across each of the socioeconomic categories.

Suicide Risk

"I bad a best friend once, and I would never trust a best friend again. My parents are a forgotten story. And my teachers, I don't feel like they 're there. I think that if I ever had a major problem, I'd be in big trouble again because I turn around, and there's no where to go. (A young woman who attempted suicide)

Many people who work with adolescents view an attempt at suicide as a call for help. Some studies have shown that of all adolescents who actually commit suicide, 40 to 50 percent had made a previous attempt.

Although there is no way to predict which young people will try to kill themselves, links between intense depression and suicidal tendencies have been noted in many studies. The results of the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey indicate that certain demographic and social experience factors are associated with higher risk of suicide for adolescents. The associations, for the most part, are stronger for girls than they are for boys.

Adolescents at the highest risk for suicide are those who indicated they had attempted suicide during the previous six months and/or said they would kill themselves if they had the chance. Adolescents at moderate risk either thought fairly seriously about committing suicide, or had made such an attempt more than a year ago but were not currently thinking about it seriously.

Unless otherwise noted, the percentages here are for adolescents at moderate to high risk for suicide. Although the percentage of adolescents in the very highest category is smaller, the patterns of association are the same across each demographic and social experience factors.

Suicide risk is associated very strongly with negative body image and with alternative family structure for girls, but not for boys. Young women with negative body images are much more likely than young women with positive body images to attempt to commit suicide or to think about it seriously (Chart 50). Of girls at high or very high risk for suicide, about three-and-a-half times as many said they had a negative body image as said they had a positive one.

On the other hand, negative body image appears to have an inverse relationship with suicide risk for boys: A greater percentage of boys at high or very high risk for suicide have a positive body image than have a negative body image. But this apparent paradox is probably due to the fact that so few boys have a negative body image, other factors--like family member suicide--are more strongly related to suicide risk.

As Chart 51 shows, a higher percentage of girls from single-parent families are at risk for suicide than are girls from two-parent families; more than twice as many girls from alternative families are at risk. Boys' risk levels, however, remain approximately the same whatever type of family they live in.

Suicide risk is associated with low levels of family connectedness, low levels of religiousness, emotional stress, and dependence on peers rather than on parents for all adolescents, but these associations are stronger for females than for males.

Adolescents, especially young women, who feel alienated from their families are more likely to be at high suicide risk than those who feel very connected to their families. As Chart 52 shows, almost five times as many young women and four times as many young men who feel alienated from their families are at risk for suicide as are adolescents who feel strong family connections.

Similarly, adolescents, especially young women, who don't have strong religious feelings are a higher risk for suicide than those who do. As Chart 53 shows, almost four times as many young women and three times as many young men who don't feel religious are at risk for suicide as are adolescents who feel very religious.

Suicide risk increases as emotional stress levels increase, as Chart 54 shows. Six times as many young women and a little less than twice as many young men who are highly stressed are at risk for suicide as are adolescents whose stress levels are low.

Adolescents who depend on their peers, rather than on their parents, for help with problems are more likely to be at risk for suicide. The strongest association with suicide risk, however, is for those adolescents who say they depend on neither for help (Chart 55). For young women, the increase is almost three-fold; for young men, it is almost double.

Suicide risk is less strongly associated with parental socioeconomic status and family stress.

Adolescents in lower socio-economic families are slightly more likely to be at risk for suicide. As Chart 56 shows, a slightly higher percentage of girls and boys from lower socio-economic families were at risk than were their counterparts from upper socioeconomic families.

Adolescents from high-stress families are also slightly more likely to be at risk for suicide. As Chart 57 shows, a slightly higher percentage of females and males from high-stress families were at moderate to high risk for suicide than were adolescents from low-stress families.

A larger proportion of adolescents from certain racial and ethnic groups are at risk for suicide than are adolescents from other groups (Chart 58). Hispanic females have the highest percentage in the moderate to high risk category; white males have the lowest. A higher percentage of females than males in each racial or ethnic group are at moderate to high suicide risk.

The only factor that puts a higher percentage of young men than young women at risk for suicide is having had a family member attempt to commit suicide recently. Chart 59 shows the percentage of adolescents at moderate to high suicide risk who have had a family member try to commit suicide in the previous six months, previous year, more than a year ago, or never. Of those at moderate to high risk, seven times as many males and three times as many females said that a member of their family tried to commit suicide in the previous six months compared with those who did not experience family-member suicide.

"If you come to school and people know that you tried to kill yourself, I mean, there's nothing left there for you. . ."

Pregnancy Risk

The factors that are associated with higher levels of pregnancy risk are similar for females and males; whatever breakdown we look at, however, a higher percentage of males than females are at moderate to high risk. Even though boys are at "higher risk" for pregnancy, statistically speaking, pregnancy is one risk that doesn't have equal consequences for both sexes. Girls are the ones who bear the primary physical, emotional, and financial risks of an early or unwanted pregnancy, both at the time of pregnancy and in the future.

Adolescents in the higher risk categories said they have sex more frequently and/or use birth control less regularly than do adolescents in the lower risk categories.

Pregnancy risk is associated for both females and males with poor performance in school, single-parent and alternative families, low levels of family connectedness, and lower socio-economic status.

For both girls and boys, pregnancy risk goes up as performance in school goes down. Adolescents who say they do poorly in school are approximately three times as likely as those who say they do well in school to be at risk for pregnancy, as Chart 60 shows.

Almost twice as many adolescents who live in one-parent families are at moderate to high risk for pregnancy than are those who live in two-parent families; almost three times as many of those who live in alternative families are at risk. As Chart 61 shows, in alternative families more than half of the girls and almost two-thirds of the boys are in the moderate to high risk category.

Adolescents who feel alienated from their families are about twice as likely as adolescents who feel strong family connections to be at moderate to high risk for pregnancy (Chart 62). Similarly, adolescents from low socio-economic status families are about twice as likely as their upper socio-economic status counterparts to be at moderate to high risk for pregnancy (Chart 63).

Pregnancy risk is less strongly associated for both females and males with high levels of family stress. A higher percentage of adolescents in high stress families are at moderate to high risk for pregnancy than are adolescents from low stress families (Chart 64).

Pregnancy risk broke down along geographic lines fairly similarly for females and males; adolescents in urban areas are more likely than other adolescents to be at moderate to high pregnancy risk than are adolescents from suburban areas, small towns, or rural Minnesota (Chart 65).

IV. RISK AND LIFE EXPERIENCE CLUSTERS

Statistical analysis of the results from the survey showed two important patterns of relationships among life experiences for young women and men.

The first pattern is found in the way risks tend to group, or "cluster," together. These risk clusters are somewhat different for girls than they are for boys. The second pattern is found in the types of life experiences that are statistically related to lower levels of risk. These life experience clusters are similar for young women and men.

Risk Clusters

Results from the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey were analyzed using a technique called factor analysis, a statistical method used to evaluate correlations among different factors--in this case, risk factors. A large set of factors is reduced to several broader groups or clusters, each having an underlying, unifying theme. A certain amount of subjectivity is involved in identifying and labeling those themes.

The analysis of the risk data for the Minnesota Adolescent Health Survey pointed out that the strongest correlations for boys were among risks that involved actions; these risks were labeled "acting out" behaviors. The strongest correlations for girls were among risks that involved psychological states or predispositions; these risks were labeled "quietly disturbed" behaviors.

The major correlations, or risk clusters, were as follows:

Acting Out Behaviors (Most Common Among Boys) Poly-Drug Use
Accident Risk
Absenteeism
Delinquency
Pregnancy Risk

Quietly Disturbed Behaviors (Most Common Among Girls) Body Image
Disordered Eating
Emotional Stress
Suicide

The correlations mean that these risks are statistically related to each other: adolescents who face one risk in a cluster tend to face one or more of the others, as well; the risks do not usually occur in isolation. That is, if a boy is using drugs, he may also be more likely than other boys to also be skipping school, or committing deviant acts, or engaging in risky sex. If a girl has a negative body image, she may be more likely than other girls to also have high levels of emotional stress and either disordered eating symptoms, suicidal tendencies, or both. The likelihood that an adolescent facing one risk in a cluster is also facing others is somewhat higher for adolescents who are acting out than it is for adolescents who are quietly disturbed.

These correlations point to a need for intervention and prevention programs that address more than one behavior at a time. The connection between gender and the two risk clusters is not absolute, however, some girls do exhibit acting out behaviors, and some boys do exhibit quietly disturbed behaviors. The clusters for these adolescents correspond, not to the adolescents' gender, but rather to the behavior type. That is, girls who act out in one way are likely to be acting out in other ways (as boys do), and boys who exhibit one quietly disturbed behavior are likely to exhibit others (as girls do).

When we analyze girls' risk on the basis of both risk types-- acting out and quietly disturbed behaviors--we find that 80 percent of the young women in this state fall in the high-risk category for at least one of the behaviors. About ten percent of all girls are in the high risk category for four or more behaviors.

There is some overlap between the two types of behavior. Of girls who exhibit two or more quietly disturbed behaviors, 80 percent were at high risk for at least one acting out behavior. And of those who are engaged in two or more acting out behaviors, 65 percent are also engaged in at least one quietly disturbed behavior. There was less of an overlap between the two behavior types with boys.

These correlations point to a need for intervention and prevention programs that address more than one behavior at a time. If a girl has attempted to commit suicide, for example, a treatment program that also addresses problems such as body-image, emotional stress, and eating disorders, and looks for problems with acting out behavior as well is likely to be more effective than a program that simply addresses suicidal behavior.

Life Experience Clusters and Lower Levels of Risk

The kinds of life experiences associated with lower levels of risk are similar for adolescent females and males. The five strongest correlations--that is, the five factors that most strongly predict low levels of risk--for the "acting out" behaviors, and for the "quietly disturbed" behaviors are listed on the following page.

These associations were analyzed using a method called "discriminant analysis," which attempts to predict risk level by looking at statistical combinations of individual variables. Fight background and social experience factors were analyzed in terms of their relationship with the two major clusters of behaviors--the acting out behaviors and the quietly disturbed behaviors.

Discriminant analysis helped to point out the kinds of factors that tend to be associated with lower risk levels for both types of behavior. The two factors that appear to be associated with lower risk levels for all adolescents are good performance in school and high levels of family connectedness. For adolescents who exhibit quietly disturbed behaviors, lower levels of family stress and higher levels of religiousness are also associated with lowered risk. And for adolescents engaged in acting out behaviors, parental help-seeking (as opposed to peer help-seeking) is an additional "protective" factor.

The correlations also work in reverse for each of the factors in the life experience clusters. For example, if good performance in school is statistically correlated with low levels of risk for acting out behaviors, poor performance in school is correlated with high levels of risk.

Acting Out Behaviors

Protective Factors for Boys
Good School Performance
High Level Religiousness
High Family Connectedness
Younger Age
Parental Help-Seeking

Protective Factors for Girls
Good School Performance
High Family Connectedness
Parental Help-Seeking
Low Family Stress
Two-Parent Family

Quietly disturbed Behavior

Protective Factors for Girls
High Family Connectedness
Good School Performance
Low Family Stress
High Level Religiousness
Younger Age

Protective Factors for Boys
High Family Connectedness
Good School Performance
Low Family Stress
High Level Religiousness
Higher Socioeconomic Status

V. THE ROLE OF SOCIETY: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

This report has presented a sobering picture of the lives of young women in Minnesota. The data shows that despite two decades of a renewed movement for women's rights, things haven't improved dramatically for girls.

The picture painted in this report is not the one most adults want to see for the young women most at risk in our society. Most people recognize that all girls have the right to lead happy, fulfilling lives, lives with options and expectations and successes. They have the right to feel valued and worthwhile for who they are; they have the right to a life free from physical and sexual abuse. For this other, more hopeful picture to come into focus, the conditions in our state and our society that cause or contribute to these problems must be addressed. Band-aid solutions cannot bring about widespread or long-lasting change.

The systemic causes of girls' troubles and the ways to create systemic change are the particular focus and interest of the Minnesota Women's Fund. The following section discusses both. This discussion is meant to be a springboard for other ideas and solutions; it is by no means intended to be the final or definitive analysis. We hope that this discussion will:

Stimulate additional research that will look at problems of particular concern to young women, the "clustering" of these problems, and ways to reduce risk; and

Create an interchange of ideas among people in positions to help young women: parents, teachers, policy makers, social workers, funders, religious and community leaders, and anyone interested in the health and well-being of young women today. This open dialogue should include discussion of concrete programs and policies to be implemented.

In order to look for solutions, we need to answer two main questions about the data in this survey. The first is "What causes girls to feel so bad about themselves and to turn their feelings inward?" To answer this question, we must look at the reasons behind the differences in the way girls and boys experience and react to the world, in particular the causes of the disturbingly frequent reports of physical and sexual abuse from girls.

The second question is, "Now what?" Based on our knowledge of these problems, we need to find ways to change the picture for girls. Our answers to this question depend, in large part, on how we answer the first.

The Minnesota Women's Fund believes the differences in risks and behaviors presented in this report result from the way girls are socialized, from the limitations that sex-role stereotyping places on them, and from society's willingness to ignore, exploit, and victimize females. The Fund takes the stand that, in order to truly and effectively deal with these troubles and remove the barriers that stand in the way of young women, solutions must address the root causes of those obstacles, by reducing or eliminating the negative aspects of socialization and sex-role stereotyping.

While it may sound easy to base an explanation of girls' troubles on "society," the negative aspects of socialization are anything but easy to deal with because they are tangled within a young woman's entire upbringing. Socializing forces are sometimes overt, sometimes subliminal. They come from schools, the media, the family, and government and religious institutions, and create a kind of invisible web that is especially insidious because most people either don't notice it or refuse to admit it is a cause of trouble.

Girls are taught from an early age that they are valued less by this society than boys are. Males get more attention and recognition in society, and their wants and needs are more often assumed to be the status quo for all young people.

Starting when they are very little, girls get less space than do boys. By and large, boys are encouraged to do things, to explore, create, and make noise. Girls are more likely to be encouraged to play quietly and cooperatively; when they do act up or act out, girls are more likely to get into trouble or be rebuked, when similar behavior from a boy would be dismissed, or even commended.[l] And passivity often causes grief for young women, and can lead to depression. Studies show that young women who spend more time engaged in passive, more traditionally "feminine" activities, such as shopping, and putting on makeup are more inclined than other girls to be depressed.[2]

News stories focus on males, talking to and about them much more often, and placing far less emphasis on topics of direct concern to females.[3] Prime-time TV programs feature adolescent male characters, while downplaying the importance of females, portraying them as being interested almost exclusively in shopping, grooming, and boyfriends, and having them function as sidekicks or background characters in a male-oriented plot.[4] A similar story is told in most children's literature and adult literature, in most movies, and in most songs.

The focus of school curricula, too, is most often on white, European males; ideas and events are usually taught from the same perspective. Even though strong efforts are being made to bring women into the picture,* it is still rare to find females included as an integral part of the main curriculum, and rarer yet to find teachers using gender-neutral methods of instruction. Most often, females are talked about in separate chapters, books, or classes, and their concerns and contributions are usually dealt with as secondary issues.

Although unaware that they do so, teachers often pay more attention to boys, are more likely to call on them, prod them, encourage them, and challenge them than they are girls.[5] Teachers--and parents--steer girls away from subjects like math and science, even when girls have a talent for them,[6] or expect girls to fall behind in these subjects. Girls studying coursework that is not traditionally considered female are often subjected to outright hostility.[7] Girls are told, implicitly and explicitly, that the subjects boys tend to excel in are the ones that are valued most by society.

In the workplace, the jobs men do are thought of more highly: pay scales in industries and areas that are traditionally male pay far more than in those that are traditionally female. The vast majority of working women are employed in poorly paid clerical and service positions, not positions of authority. In fact, more than two-thirds of all minimum-wage workers are women.[8]

(*) Minnesota recently passed a multicultural gender-fair curriculum rule, requiring all schools in the state to begin to develop inclusive curricula that focus on women and people of color as well as white males. Often, however, inclusive texts are unavailable, and districts are unaware of ways to implement inclusive programs.

Even when they do the same work, women almost always get paid less than men. Female-headed families make up the vast majority of families in poverty, in large part because salaries for women are so much lower than those for men.[9] Reduced expectations and limited opportunities often lead to hopelessness and despair for young women, lower their levels of self-esteem, and contribute to their feelings of worthlessness.

Girls are taught that what value they do have is determined, to a great extent, by how they look, and by their relationships to others. They learn to believe that they have to live up to a rigid standard of beauty; the closer to the standard they come, the more worthy they are. Girls who feel they don't live up to these unattainable standards often have low self-esteem; they don't like themselves much and think others don't either.[10] Young women rarely blame the standards for being ridiculous; they blame themselves for falling short.

Society teaches girls that violence against females is acceptable. Almost every day, girls see, hear, or read about females being assaulted physically and sexually, both in real life, in movies, and on T.V. In many cases, rape and battering are perpetrated by people with whom the victim is acquainted--often, by trusted family members, friends, or people of authority. Girls hear, in most cases of sexual assault, that somehow the female was at fault, somehow she "asked for it." Studies show that both boys and girls believe a man has a right to force sex on a woman in a variety of circumstances, including if he bought her dinner, if he is married to her, or if she'd been drinking.[11]

New studies suggest that up to half of all adult women experience physical abuse or coercion in relationships, and that up to three-quarters are sexually harassed on the job or in school.[12] It is not hard to see how girls and boys can come to believe that violence against women is acceptable.

The violence isn't limited to adult women. Many girls have friends who have been physically or sexually abused, or both; or, they may be abused themselves. When they tell people about it, they are often either ignored or not believed. The judicial system does little to punish the people abuse females: conservative estimates indicate that only one in 10,000 cases of sexual assault result in a conviction.[13]