An article in the Associated Press lists the percentages of unwed mothers with demographics separated along color lines and generated from 2008 government data. This data reveals a dramatic trend in the nation's communities. The particular focus of the article is on African American mothers who have the highest rate, a near three quarters, of unwed mothers. Following behind are Native Americans and Latinos. The exact percentages of unwed mothers broken down by color lines are 72% for African Americans, 66% for Native Americans, 53% for Latinos, 29% for whites and 17% for Asians. As a nation the U.S. rate of unwed mothers was 41%.

The sacredness of marriage as a declining trend is not secluded to the African American community as the rate for unwed mothers is incomparable to previous decades in many of the racial groupings. In 1965, the rate for African Americans was 24% and for whites it was 4%. More alarming the article discusses the correlation of children from single parent households with incarceration, poverty and school completion.

An obstretrition with long standing service in a Houston African American community indicates that entering motherhood as a single parent has become an accepted practice. Motherhood is an inherent part of life that most young women naturally want to fulfill and many times the standards of a life long partner are not met in their communities. The literature and academic discourse as to why women fulfill a single parent role out of wedlock is rooted in many sociological factors that include, segregation, education and poverty. With each factor interrelated to one another in explaining and providing evidence to the high proportion of unwed mothers in historically marginalized communities.