Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by BB on February 1, 2010 at 3:59pm

Without reading the article, I'm going to guess it means that it was able to delay the sexual activity at least until after the class?

I've read the article and I'm not sure the numbers are all that promising - why would we ever teach a sex-ed course without suggesting that the best way to prevent pregnancy and transmission of STDs is to not have sex?
I think it is important to remember that there is a big difference between "don't have sex or you'll burn in hell" and teaching people honestly.

Permalink Reply by Gaga on February 1, 2010 at 4:07pm

eheh, no. Apparently, in the following two years, 33% of the kids in the abstinence-only program started having sex vs. 52% in the safe-sex program (and 42% of the control group)
(or something along those lines - I'm quoting from memory)

Permalink Reply by Ester on February 1, 2010 at 4:59pm

I do not think that is a very large group. 662 students so that is only 331 per group. Very small numbers for a study like this to be done. And what is more important than the fact that 67% of the students 'delayed' sexual activity is that these students probably still did not wait until marriage and when they did have sex they probably did not use condoms or any type of birth control and thus were more likely to get pregnant and spread STDs because they were not educated. There needs to be more done to a study like this. To be valid it needs to have a larger and more diverse sample size and they need to follow the students longer. I would like to see how long these students did wait and I would like to see incidence of pregnancy and STD. Durex did a study among developed nations and compared pregnancy, STD, abortion and the avg age people start to have sex. The avg age was about the same but the teen pregnancy rates, abortion rates and STD rates in the US and Canada were way higher than the rest of the developed world. over 500 of every 1000 people in the US will get Chlamydia or Gonorrhea compared to like 6 out of every 1000 in Germany (approx i don't remember the study exactly) because in Europe they use condoms. It is maybe not so much the education but society as a whole. The US is a very sexually repressed nation.

Permalink Reply by Joe Tomberlin on February 1, 2010 at 11:56pm

Doesn't really sound like an 'Abstinence Only" program to me.

One description of the study said "It did not take a moralistic tone ... the sessions encouraged children to delay sex until they are ready, not necessarily until married; did not portray sex outside marriage as never appropriate; and did not disparage condoms.

The whole point of the abstinence only was NO sex before marriage, period, no sex, not delay sex; until married, not until ready; never appropriate outside marriage; and never talk about condoms.

Just sounds like a dishonest attempt to redeem the name of Abstinence Only so they can then sneek the real thing back in again after folks have dropped their guard.

Am I just being too cynical or just "fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." (G.W.Bush, 2002)

Permalink Reply by Cecilia on February 2, 2010 at 12:16am

Right, most studies that I've heard of show that kids who get comprehensive (vs. abstinence only) sex ed actually have sex 18 months - 2 years later than kids who get the abstinence only ed.

Permalink Reply by Diana on February 4, 2010 at 3:18pm

It could have been that including other races might have shown the opposite result. It would be a way to manipulate the results to get what you want unless you think no one would do that.