while existing laws and public opinion stigmatize the older boyfriend/younger girlfriend relationship the young women involved with these men often do not view their relationships, or themselves, in a negative light. this article concerns the following question: How do teenage girl involved with older boyfriends view their relationships? I address this question by providing a conceptual framework for understanding the different ways that teenage mothers account for their involvement with adult boyfriends.
In many ways, the issue of whether or not young women view their behavior as deviant can be conceptualized as an account application. Like other forms of aligning actions, such as Sykes and Matza's "techniques of neutralization" or Mill 's "motive talk". Scott and Lyman's "accounts" are also meant to " verbally bridge the gap between action and expectation " by offering an explanation for by the deviant engaged in behavior that was not congruent with normative expectations. Scott and Lyman distinguish between two types of accounts: justifications and excuses. they describe justifications as "accounts in which one accepts responsibility for the act in question, bot denies the pejorative quality associated with it " Excuses, in contrast, are "accounts in which one admits that the act in question is bad, wrong , or inappropriate but denies full responsibility" .Accounts, in the from of justifications or excuses, art the deviant's effort to minimize damage to his or her identity after the deviant act has been performed or discovered.