Policy Brief Unleashing aspirations while ensuring opportunities could help reduce teenage pregnancy in Latin America and the Caribbean June 2024 Photo: Female librarian helping to find a book by AzmanJaka via canva.com KEY MESSAGES Two-thirds of youth aged 15-24 out of school and out of work in Latin America and the Caribbean are girls, mainly because the region has one of the highest rates of teenage pregnancy in the world. There is empirical evidence that teenage pregnancy is linked to girls’ low aspirations, which are shaped by lack of role models, information, and confidence due to social norms. Policy interventions can help boost adolescent girls’ aspirations and opportunities through exposure to role models, vocational training including life skills training, and conditional cash transfers. CONTEXT Teen pregnancies are common in Latin America Teenage girls’ low aspirations can be both a cause and the Caribbean and pose risks for the mother and a consequence of their early pregnancy. and her future family. Though it has fallen, the Aspirations are people’s ideals for the future, region has the second highest teen pregnancy rate including their education level, type of job, wealth, in the world (55 births per 1,000 girls aged 15-19), family, and social status, all of which are shaped by after Sub-Saharan Africa (World Bank 2023a) their circumstances and social environment (Ray (Figure 1). Teenage pregnancy poses risk of health 2006; Genicot and Ray 2020; Fruttero, Muller, and complications and can lead to lower educational Calvo-González 2024). achievement and fewer job opportunities (Azevedo et al. 2012; The Economist 2019; World Bank Aspirations can be motivating life goals. However, 2023a). they can also be limited prospects that lead to missed opportunities, especially in the context of Indeed, young women are more likely to be out of poverty (Ray 2006; Dalton, Ghosal, and Mani 2016). school and to be jobless than men. Two thirds of With low aspirations and no clear foreseeable the region’s youth (aged 15-24) out of school and opportunities, teenage girls can think of getting out of work are women, a quarter of all women of pregnant as a relatively appealing outcome this age (16 percent for men) (de Hoyos, Rogers, (Azevedo et al. 2012). Further, dropping out of and Székely 2016; World Bank 2023b).[1] The most school and being jobless can reduce adolescent important predictor for young women to be in that mothers’ aspirations. situation is teenage pregnancy (World Bank 2023a). [2] Figure 1. Teenage pregnancy in Latin America is falling but stubbornly high Average birth per 1,000 women aged 15-19 in five regions, 2000-21 Source: United Nations Population Division, World Population Prospects. [1] 15- to 24-year-old who are out of school and out of work are referred to as “NEET”: Not in Education, Employment, nor Training. [2] In 2010, 20 percent of NEET girls in Latin America and the Caribbean had started their own household with children, compared to only 1 percent in the case of NEET boys (de Hoyos, Rogers, and Popova 2015). In 2019, 70 percent of NEET girls compared to 10 percent of NEET boys were responsible for household care work (World Bank 2022). STUDY DESCRIPTION A framework paper (Muller et al. 2024), supported aspirations or opportunities in isolation can lead to by the Latin America and the Caribbean Gender unfavorable scenarios, such as falling into an Innovation Lab (LACGIL), presents a framework to aspiration trap (missed opportunities due to low foster aspirations, while ensuring that aspirations), experiencing frustration (when opportunities are in place to accomplish them, aspirations are enhanced without matching offering a tool for policymakers and researchers to opportunities) or a perpetuating a poverty trap diagnose situations and design policy interventions. (when only one of these dimensions is fostered). Aspirations are linked to a range of educational, employment, and business outcomes (Fruttero, While the framework applies to a broad range of Muller, and Calvo-González 2024), but high policy fields (from antipoverty programs to aspirations without the opportunities to achieve coaching programs to microentrepreneurs, them can backfire, make people worse off, and can mentoring for students, and role models lead to frustration (Ray 2006; Genicot and Ray interventions for student girls and adult women, 2020). among others), it is useful to think about its implications in the context of teenage pregnancy in To facilitate the design of policy interventions, our Latin America and the Caribbean. framework highlights that addressing either Photo: Educator assisting STEM students in a lab by xavierarnau via canva.com [1] 15- to 24-year-old who are out of school and out of work are referred to as “NEET”: Not in Education, Employment, nor Training. [2] In 2010, 20 percent of NEET girls in Latin America and the Caribbean had started their own household with children, compared to only 1 percent in the case of NEET boys (de Hoyos, Rogers, and Popova 2015). In 2019, 70 percent of NEET girls compared to 10 percent of NEET boys were responsible for household care work (World Bank 2022). THE EVIDENCE There is empirical evidence that teenage pregnancy 1. Girls may not be aware of the opportunities in Latin America and the Caribbean may result from they could aspire to, such as various an aspiration trap, in which girls miss opportunities educational paths or job types. Illustrating the by being unaware of them or feeling unable to impact of providing information, tenth graders achieve them. [3] in Mexico who received information on the benefits of education and the availability of Cross-sectional and panel data show that higher-education scholarships through adolescent girls with lower educational aspirations interactive computer software got higher math are more likely to become NEET (Not in Education, scores in a national test two years later Employment, nor Training) and to become pregnant (Avitabile and de Hoyos 2018). Girls particularly while in their teenage years. Youth with higher benefited from the program and were more educational aspirations are significantly less likely likely to choose to study economics in high to be NEET in five out of seven Latin American school and were less likely to wish to be married countries that took part in a cross-sectional survey at ages 18-20. in 2017-18, especially female youth (Alvarado et al. 2. Girls may incorrectly believe that they are 2020).[4] Remarkably, the correlation holds even incapable of fulfilling higher aspirations. The after controlling for socioeconomic characteristics, underestimation of abilities and opportunities which means low aspirations are linked to being often results from a combination of lacking role NEET beyond income status. Consistently, panel models, restrictive social norms, and data in Peru show that 15-year-olds aspiring to stereotypes, which are self-reinforcing. As a complete university in 2009 were less likely to have result, the scarcity of women in traditionally unprotected sex at the age of 19 (Favara and male-dominated fields can discourage female Sánchez 2017), and teenage girls with higher students from pursuing careers in those areas. education aspirations and self-efficacy (confidence [6] Such factors may explain, for example, why in abilities to achieve objectives) were less likely to women are less likely to study in STEM fields become pregnant at the same age (Favara, Lavado, around the world, including in Colombia (Dulce- and Sánchez 2020).[5] Salcedo et al. 2022).[7] There is evidence that female role models do inspire girls. Indeed, A 2012 qualitative study on teenage pregnancy in female students in Colombia who were exposed Ecuador also concluded that limited aspirations for to a higher proportion of female STEM teachers the future — reinforced by a lack of agency — was during secondary education have a higher one of the key determinants of the outcome probability of enrollment in tertiary STEM (Azevedo et al. 2012). For most of the girls programs, while such a relation is not observed interviewed for the study, the pregnancy was for men (Dulce-Salcedo et al. 2022). Similarly, in unplanned and did not aspire to a clear path Peru and Mexico, showcasing success stories of towards higher education or anything similar that women alumni doubled girls’ applications to a would have been interrupted. software-coding program (Del Carpio and Guadalupe 2022). The 2012 qualitative study in Although there is no evidence to unveil Ecuador illustrates the role of restrictive social unambiguously the causes of pregnant teenagers’ norms and stereotypes: the study finds that low aspirations, two interrelated factors may pregnancy was perceived by teenage girls as a influence it: faster transition towards adult life and that it [3] Empirical studies measure aspirations with indexes built from surveys. For a review and discussion of empirical measures of aspirations, see Fruttero, Muller, and Calvo-González (2021). [4] The seven countries are Brazil, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Haiti, Mexico, and Paraguay. The statistically significant and negative correlation holds among youths in all countries but El Salvador and Haiti. [5] These studies are observational, rather than causal, and could be biased by unobserved factors, endogeneity and measurement errors, they show robust associations controlling for other relevant factors. fitted traditional gender roles and stereotypes Teenage girls may also suffer a poverty trap, in highly prevalent among youths in the country which they are in a vicious circle of low aspirations (Azevedo et al. 2012). For both girls and boys, the (possibly caused by the same factors above predominant association with being a woman was mentioned) and low opportunities. Indeed, poor girls being a mother; they described the home as the tend to be more likely to become pregnant as a predominant space of the woman and described the teenager, for example in Peru (Favara, Lavado, and role of the man as that of breadwinner and Sánchez 2020), and to be NEET (de Hoyos, Rogers, decisionmaker. and Székely 2016). Photo: An aerial view of a group of students being taught by their female tutor by SolStock via canva.com [6] It is also possible that even though girls would be aware of their opportunities and feel capable to pursue them, they might not be willing to do so to avoid social isolation. For example, girls may avoid STEM carriers to avoid male-dominated fields. [7] In the United States, for instance, women with strong math abilities underestimate their math skills, which prevent them from pursuing STEM majors, despite large returns to such degrees (Saltiel 2023). POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS While a review of interventions aiming to improve the well-being of adolescent girls found no interventions to be categorically effective across multiple contexts in delaying pregnancies among adolescent girls (Bergstrom and Özler 2023), some related to increasing aspirations and opportunities are promising. Increasing aspirations through role models Role models can play a crucial role in expanding horizons and demonstrating that seemingly unattainable outcomes are, in fact, achievable. They could include live role models. For example, a school in Colombia introduced a “sexual-citizenship” curriculum, which involved older students talking to younger ones about sex and reduced the number of pregnancies among its 4,000 pupils from 70 a year to zero (The Economist 2019). Being exposed to role models through videos could help too, especially in countries like Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico where long-lasting soap operas are highly popular. For example, in the 1960s fertility rates started to drop in Brazilian cities that could receive soap operas featuring families with fewer children than the average Brazilian family at that time (La Ferrara, Chong and Duryea 2012). Similarly, in the United States, the MTV show 16 and Pregnant, which depicted the problems that young girls face when they get pregnant, contributed to a significant reduction in teen pregnancy rates during the months after its introduction (Kearney and Levine 2015). Increasing aspirations and opportunities through job and life skills training programs Job training programs mixing vocational and life skills training can enhance aspirations and better opportunities and discourage early pregnancy. An example of this type of program in the Dominican Republic included workshops to increase participants’ self-esteem, self-efficacy, and enhancement of life plans. It reduced teenage pregnancy by 20 percent by improving adolescents’ socioemotional skills and aspirations (Novella and Ripani 2016). There are some successful examples from other regions too. Take the case of a club for adolescent girls in Uganda, which combined vocational training focused on small- scale income-generating activities and life skills training to foster aspirations and help girls make informed choices about sex, reproduction, and marriage (Bandiera et al. 2020). The program raised the likelihood that girls are self-employed by half, without reducing their schooling enrollment. It also reduced teen pregnancy, early entry into marriage/cohabitation, and the share of girls reporting sex against their will. A similar intervention teaching socioemotional skills, especially around traditional gender roles, to teenage girls without vocational training increased school enrollment and higher take-up of health services and use of modern contraceptive methods in Argentina (World Bank 2020). Increasing aspirations and opportunities through conditional cash transfers Conditional cash transfers (CCTs) can also provide an opportunity that raises aspirations. For example, a CCT program in Colombia where adolescent girls received a subsidy if they attended school, completed their school year, and enrolled in the following year, reduced pregnancy among adolescents across all grades included in the program (Cortés, Gallego, and Maldonado 2016). A likely channel is that staying longer in school raises aspirations, while also increasing current opportunities (the subsidy) and future opportunities (employment).[8] [8] The national CCT programs in Colombia and Mexico raised the aspirations of their beneficiaries, in part by facilitating interactions with education and health professionals who provided information about available opportunities. (García, Harker, and Cuartas 2019; Chiapa, Garrido, and Prina 2012). REFERENCES Azevedo, J. P., M. Favara, S. E. Haddock, L. F. López- Dulce-Salcedo, O. V., D. Maldonado, and F. Sánchez. Calva, M. Muller, E. Perova. 2012. 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LAC Gender Notes Washington, DC: americas/2019/02/16/latin-america-is-losing-its- World Bank. battle-against-teen-pregnancy https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/354 World Bank. 2020. “Fostering Skills for Young 491642741732903/pdf/Facilitating-the-School-to- Women in Argentina”. eMBeD brief. Washington, DC: Work-Transition-of-Young-Women.pdf World Bank. http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/73672 1587534719829/Fostering-Skills-for-Young- Women-in-Argentina 2022. “The Social and Educational Consequences of Adolescent Childbearing”. Data story from World Bank's Gender Data Portal. https://genderdata.worldbank.org/data- stories/adolescent-fertility/ ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This note was prepared by Noël Muller. It received This work has been funded by the Umbrella Facility useful comments from Carlos Rodriguez Castelan, for Gender Equality (UFGE), which is a multidonor Jacobus de Hoop, Phoebe W. Ishak and Raquel trust fund administered by the World Bank to Melgar Calderón. advance gender equality and women’s empowerment through experimentation and The LACGIL supports impact evaluations and knowledge creation aimed at helping governments inferential research to generate evidence on what and the private sector focus policies and programs works in closing gender gaps in human capital, on scalable solutions with sustainable outcomes. economic participation, social norms, and agency. The UFGE is supported with generous contributions Additionally, the lab disseminates findings to from Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, improve operations and policy making in the design Iceland, Latvia, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, of cost-effective interventions that tackle gender Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the inequalities and drive change. To accomplish this, United States, and the Bill and Melinda Gates the LACGIL works in partnership with World Bank Foundation. 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