Multiracial Children and Low Birth Weight in the United States and United Kingdom

Kate H. Choi, Western University

Although prior studies frame the importance of studying intermarriage patterns in terms of the increasing demographic salience of multiracial individuals and their potential to blur race/ethnic distinctions, the literature offers few insights into how the outcomes of multiracial individuals compare to those of their mono-racial counterparts. To fill this gap, we use two birth cohort studies – the American Fragile Family Studies of Child Wellbeing and the British Millennium Cohort Study, to compare disparities in low birth weight among multiracial and monoracial infants from various race/ethnic groups in the US and the UK. The birth outcomes of multiracial children in both the United States and United Kingdom fall somewhere in between Whites and mono-racial minorities. Although SES accounts for a considerable portion of the disparities in birth outcome between mono-racial Whites and multiracial children in the US, it explains little of the disparities in birth outcomes between these groups in the United Kingdom.