Contributed by William Angelos| 15 April, 2007 00:57 GMT
A study commissioned by the U.S. Congress concluded that students involved in programs designed to promote sexual abstinence were no more likely to refrain from having sex than their peers who did not participate in such programs.
Christopher Trenholm and colleagues at Mathematica Policy Research, Inc., conducted interviews with more than 2,000 subjects in Florida, Wisconsin, Mississippi and Virginia whose average age was 16 1/2 years.
Approximately 1,200 of the teens had participated in abstinence-only education programs four to six years earlier.
Those who attended the programs started having sex at about the same age as their counterparts, about 15 years old on average, the investigators found. They also reported a similar number of sexual partners as the non-attending group.
About 25 percent in both groups reported having three or more sexual partners.
Both groups of teens used condoms or other forms of birth control to the same extent, a finding that countered a frequent criticism leveled by opponents of abstinence-only programs -- that they might result in more unprotected sex.
Opponents of abstinence-only programs said the report confirms the need for more comprehensive education about abstinence, contraception and sex in general.
Those in favor of abstinence-only education argued that the report suggests the need for more such programs, with changes incorporated to make them more effective. |
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