Abstract
Racially mixed children are a rapidly expanding segment of American families, signaling the ongoing blurring of racial boundaries. Most of what is known about multiraciality is drawn from analyses of two-parent families even as marriage became decreasingly tied to childbearing. The current study tracked the prevalence and racial composition of multiracial families where parents are married and unmarried from 1980 until 2018 using data from the U.S. Census and American Community Survey. We find that multiracial families are increasingly common amongst married and unmarried parents with the greatest growth occurring among White unmarried mothers, nearly 15% of whom have multiracial children as of 2018. Additionally, we find that Asian-White and Hispanic-White children are more likely to live in married families while Black-White and dual minority children are disproportionately represented amongst single-parent families. Ultimately, capturing the complexity of racialized contexts where multiracial children are found, as well as how the prevalence of these contexts has changed over time, requires accounting for family structure differences.
Highlights
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Multiracial families with children are rapidly growing, but this is largely tracked solely among married households.
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Using 1980–2018 U.S. Census and American Community Survey data, we find growing married and unmarried multiracial families.
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Unmarried families are increasingly multiracial, most often composed of Black-White children with White mothers.
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Meanwhile, Hispanic-White and Asian-White children are more common among married families.
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The lives of multiracial children will be increasingly shaped by different racialized and gendered family contexts.
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Notes
The data include race/ethnic groups beyond these four including Asian. American Indian/Alaskan Native, Pacific Islander, and SOR however, we restrict the presentation to those with at least 1,000 cases in the each cell to ensure that estimates are reliable.
We use 1990 instead of 1980 as family structure types are measured in the same way. Single mothers in both years are families where mothers are without an unmarried partner.
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Bratter, J., Casarez, R.S., Farrell, A. et al. Counting Families, Counting Race: Assessing Visible Family Structural Change among Multiracial Families, 1980–2018. J Child Fam Stud 31, 609–622 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-022-02244-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-022-02244-x