By Genaro C. Armas/AP
Though new immigrants have given birth to a diverse API mix, one trend amongst Asian Americans remains constant across the board: they are less likely than whites or blacks to have households headed by single mothers.
The trend is clear in both rural and urban states. According to new census data that reflects racial differences in the makeup of the American family, Maryland, for instance, shows that 4.2 percent of Asian American family households were headed by a single mother, compared with 6.6 percent of non-Latino white families and 25.1 percent of black families. In New York, 4.4 percent of API households were headed by a single mother, compared with 6.8 percent of non-Latino white families and 29.6 percent of black families.
Montana, on the other hand, had one of the highest percentages of Asian American single-mother homes, at 10.4 percent.
The data from census figures released so far to 20 states and the District of Columbia could refocus attention on long-noted cultural and socio-economic differences among racial and ethnic groups.
During the 1990s, many Asian Americans were new immigrants, typically from more traditional, conservative, family-centered backgrounds and “do not really accept nontraditional households,” said Sharon Lee, a sociology professor at Portland State University.
But that upbringing may also cause a possible undercount of API single-mother households, said Christopher Kui, executive director of Asian Americans for Equality.
Because divorce and single-motherhood tend to have more of a social stigma in Asian American families, “there are hidden separations that people don’t talk about,” Kui said.
Nationally, there was a 25 percent increase between 1990 and 2000 in the category of “female householder, no husband present with own children under 18,” regardless of race.
That category also includes a women raising a child with an unmarried partner, or women living with a parent or friend who helps with child-rearing. But surveys show that most of those households include only single mothers, bureau analyst Jason Fields said.
There are no national breakdowns by race and Latino origin available yet for 2000.
On the state level, references to race in 2000 refer to those who selected only one race on their form; the figures do not include those who may have taken advantage of the first-ever option of checking off more than one race.
The share of API single-mother family households was lower than for whites and blacks in 15 of the 20 states released. All 50 states are scheduled to get their numbers by next month.
Overall, single-parent homes have risen tremendously over the past 30 years, though census surveys indicate that the increases slowed during the latter half of the 1990s, said John Haaga, a demographer with the Population Reference Bureau.
Black women tend to have a higher percentage of out-of-wedlock births than other minority groups, said Paul Watanabe, co-director of the Institute for Asian American Studies at the University of Massachusetts-Boston. One of the highest shares for black families was in Nebraska, where 34 percent were single-mother homes.
Bianca Robinson, 21 and black, divides her time between raising a 2-year-old daughter on her own and working in a pre-law program at the University of Illinois. Her daughter spends much of the summer with her father, whom Robinson did not marry and does not live with. Robinson depends on friends to help care for the child while she is in class or at work.
“For some people I know, the child’s father isn’t involved, and some of them have a harder time financially,” said Robinson, who helps organize a group for single mothers of all races at the school. “I get a lot of help.” |
