America’s legendary “Melting Pot” has assimilated millions of immigrants from around the globe into our society, and in process greatly improve their lot, usually by the third generation. But that’s not what’s happening with Hispanics, who represent the largest wave of immigration into the United States since the 1920s. A Pew Hispanic Center study found that on a number of social indicators, third-generation Hispanics are actually worse off than their first-and second-generation counterparts.

“The children of Latino immigrants experience better outcomes than do Latino children in the third or higher generations” the study found, the reverse of how the Melting Pot process is supposed to work. Hispanic children of U.S.-born parents have lower birth weights, more health problems during childhood, and higher rates of smoking, alcohol and illegal drug consumption. They also engage in more violent or delinquent behavior as adolescents.