Alba was born in Pomona, California to Catherine (née Jensen) and Mark Alba. Her mother is of Danish and French Canadian descent and her father is Mexican American, though both of her parents were born in California (on the December 1, 2009 episode of Lopez Tonight, George Lopez announced that a DNA test showed Alba to be 87% European and 13% Indigenous American). She has a younger brother, Joshua. Her father's Air Force career took the family to Biloxi, Mississippi, and Del Rio, Texas, before settling back in California when she was nine years old. Alba described her family as being a "very conservative family—a traditional, Catholic, Latin American family" and herself as very liberal; she says she had identified herself as a "feminist" as early as age five.
