The number of non-U.S. citizen children coming to this country from Latin American countries to reside here is on the decline, according to a recent study by the Washington-based Pew Hispanic Center.

The group issued a study it compiled of U.S. Census Bureau data that found the number of people under 18 living in this country with Latino ethnicity is at a high of about 16 million. They account for about 22 percent of all children in the United States.

But only 7 percent of those Latino youths are not U.S. citizens themselves.

The most common type of Latino youth, according to the Pew study released in late May, is one who is born in this country, but to at least one parent who was born elsewhere. Fifty-two percent of Latino youth fall into that category.

Of those, about six in 10 (or more than half) are born to two parents who are either naturalized citizens of the United States or have the proper visa and other papers allowing them to live openly in this country.

Alicia Rios, a regional vice president with the League of United Latin American Citizens, said she sees the growing assimilation of Latinos as all the more reason for her group to work on their behalf.

"We're going to have to reach out to more people, be more inclusive to make everybody aware of the services we can provide to them," Rios said.

It is roughly four in 10 of these second-generation Latinos in this country who have at least one parent whose citizenship or residency status in the United States is questionable.

The Pew study found that 37 percent of Latino youth are third generation or more, which means they are U.S. citizens born to parents who also are U.S. citizens.

How aware those young people will be of their ethnic roots will depend on their parents, although one of the findings of the Pew study is that these third-generation kids are most likely to be raised in single parent families.

"A lot is going to depend on the family structure and how much their ethnicity is emphasized," Rios said.

The Pew study found that the trend of coming years will be a decline of second-generation and a moving along to the third-generation for Latino youths.

The group did an analysis that estimates, in 16 years, the number of third-generation children will be higher than second-generation. The group also figures that by 2025, about 30 percent of all children in this country will be of Latino ethnic backgrounds.

If the estimates the trend would look like it did in 1980 when 57 percent of all Latino youths in this country were third-generation, compared to 30 percent second-generation and 13 percent first-generation.

Three decades ago, Latino youths only accounted for about 9 percent of all children in this country.