The Parliamentary Research Service prepares papers on legislation before the Parliament and on major issues of interest to members. Papers cover a broad range of subject areas including law, politics, government, environment, economics and social issues Oct 26, · Publishes research on all aspects of sex, sexuality and sex and relationships education, including LGBT education, STI education and homonormativity research Aug 22, · Abstinence-only-until-marriage approaches have set back sex education, family planning, and HIV-prevention efforts. Between and , the percentage of schools in the U.S. that require students to learn about human sexuality fell from 67 percent to 48 percent, and requirements for HIV prevention declined from 64 percent to 41 percent
Abstinence Only Education is a Failure | Columbia Public Health
Try out PMC Labs and tell us what you think. Learn More. Conceived and designed the experiments: DWH KSH. Performed the experiments: DWH KSH. Analyzed the data: DWH KSH. Wrote the paper: DWH KSH. The United States ranks first among developed nations in rates of both teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.
In an effort to reduce these rates, the U, sex education research papers. government has funded abstinence-only sex education programs for more than a decade.
However, a public controversy remains over whether this investment has been successful and whether these programs should be continued. Using the most recent national data from all U. This trend remains significant after accounting for socioeconomic status, teen educational attainment, ethnic composition of the teen population, and availability of Medicaid waivers for family planning services in each state.
These data show clearly that abstinence-only education as a state policy is ineffective in preventing teenage pregnancy and may actually be contributing to the high teenage pregnancy rates in the U. In alignment with the new evidence-based Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative and the Precaution Adoption Process Model advocated sex education research papers the National Institutes of Health, we propose the integration of comprehensive sex and STD education into the biology curriculum in middle and high school science classes and a parallel social studies curriculum that addresses risk-aversion behaviors and planning for the future.
The appropriate type of sex education that should be taught in U. public schools continues to be a major topic of debate, which is motivated by the high teen pregnancy and birth rates in the U. Much of this debate has centered on whether abstinence-only versus comprehensive sex education should be taught in public schools. Some argue that sex education that covers safe sexual practices, such as condom use, sends a mixed message to students and promotes sexual activity. This view has been supported by the US government, sex education research papers, which promotes abstinence-only initiatives through the Adolescent Family Life Act AFLACommunity-Based Abstinence Education CBAE and Title V, Section of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of welfare reformamong others [5].
The central message of sex education research papers programs is to delay sexual activity until marriage, and under sex education research papers federal funding regulations most of these programs cannot include information about contraception or safer-sex practices [5]sex education research papers. The federal funding for abstinence-only education expired on June 30,and no funds were allocated for the FY budget.
This constitutes the first large-scale federal investment dedicated to preventing teen pregnancy through research- and evidence-based efforts. This was authorized by the legislature on March 23, [9]. With two types of federal funding programs available, legislators of individual states now have the opportunity to decide which type of sex education and which funding option to choose for their state, while pursuing the ultimate goal of reducing teen pregnancy rates.
This large-scale analysis aims to provide scientific evidence for this decision by evaluating the most recent data on the effectiveness of different sex education programs with regard to preventing teen pregnancy for the U, sex education research papers.
as a whole. We used the most recent teenage pregnancy, sex education research papers, abortion and birth data from all U.
teen pregnancy rates? Other factors may also influence teenage pregnancy and birth rates, including socio-economic status, education, cultural influences [10] — [12]and access to contraception through Medicaid waivers [13] — [15] and such effects must be parsed out statistically to examine the relationship between sex education and sex education research papers pregnancy and birth rates.
It was the goal of this study to evaluate the current sex-education approach in the U. teen pregnancy rates. Based on a national analysis of all available state data, our results clearly show that abstinence-only education does not reduce and likely increases teen pregnancy rates.
Data on abstinence education were retrieved from the Education Commission of the States [16]. Of the 50 U. states, only 38 states had sex sex education research papers laws as of ; Table 2. Thirty of the 38 state laws contained abstinence education sex education research papers, 8 states did not. Following the analysis of the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center [17]which categorizes the data on abstinence education into four levels from least to most emphasis on abstinence: no provision, abstinence covered, sex education research papers, abstinence promoted, abstinence stressedwe assigned ordinal values from 0 through 3 to each of these four categories respectively.
These policies may be published as Health Education standards or Public Education codes [19]. These policies can also provide information on how existing sex education laws sex education research papers be interpreted by local school boards, sex education research papers. Information on the sex education laws and policies for all 50 US states was retrieved from the website of the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the US SIECUS.
We analyzed the state profiles on sex education laws and policy data for all 50 states [19] following the criteria of the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center [17] to identify the level of abstinence education Table 2. Analyses of the two data sets gave essentially identical results. In this paper we present the analyses of the more extensive 48 states law and policy data set.
Data on teen pregnancy, birth and abortion rates were retrieved for the 48 states from the most recent national reports, which cover data through [11][12]. The data are reported as number of teen pregnancies, teen births or teen abortions per one thousand female teens between 15 and 19 years of age.
In general, teen pregnancy rates are calculated based sex education research papers reported teen birth and abortion rates, along with an estimated miscarriage rate [12]. We used these data to determine whether there is a significant correlation between level of prescribed abstinence education and teen pregnancy and birth rates across states. The expectation is that higher levels of abstinence education will be correlated with higher levels of abstinence behavior and thus lower levels of teen pregnancy.
Data on four possibly confounding factors were included in our analyses. To account for cost-of-living differences across the US, we used the adjusted median household income for for each state from the Council for Community and Economic Research: C2ER [20]. These data are based on median household income from the Current Population Survey for from the U.
Census Bureau [21] and the cost of living index COLI. We determined the proportion of the three major ethnic groups white, black, Hispanic in the teen population 15—19 years old for each state [12]and assessed whether the teen pregnancy, abortion and birth rates across states were correlated with the ethnic composition of the teen population.
To account for the ethnic diversity among the teen populations in the different states in a multivariate analysis of teen pregnancy and birth rates, we included only sex education research papers proportion of white and black teens in the state populations as covariates, because the Hispanic teen population numbers were not normally distributed see below. Medicaid-funded access to contraceptives and family planning services has been shown to decrease the incidence of unplanned pregnancies, especially among low-income women and teens [13].
According to the Guttmacher Institute, the national family planning program prevents 1, sex education research papers. Since the increasing role of Medicaid in funding family planning was mainly due to the efforts of 21 states to expand eligibility for family planning for low-income women who otherwise would not qualify for Medicaid, we analyzed whether these Medicaid waivers for family planning services available in some states but not in others could bias our results.
We determined which states had received permission as of from the Federal Medicaid program to extend Medicaid eligibility for family planning services to large numbers of individuals whose incomes are above the state-set levels for Medicaid enrollment [15]. We assessed whether the waivers access to family planning services had an effect on our analysis of teen pregnancy and birth rates across states, specifically whether they could bias our analysis with respect to the effects of the different levels of abstinence education.
Using JMP 8 software [23]we tested all variables for normality Goodness of Fit: Shapiro Wilkes Test; JMP 8. Except for teen abortion rates and Hispanic teen population data, all variables were normally distributed. The distribution of the Hispanic teen population across states was not normal: most states had relatively small Hispanic teen populations, and a few states had a relatively large population of Hispanic teens.
Teen pregnancy and birth rate distributions included outliers, but these outliers did not cause the distributions within abstinence education levels to differ significantly from normal, thus all outliers were included in subsequent analyses. For all further statistical analyses we used SPSS [24]. We used non-parametric Spearman correlations to assess relationships between variables, and for normally distributed variables we also used parametric Pearson correlations, but these results showed the same trends and significance levels as the non-parametric correlations.
As a result, we only report the results for the non-parametric correlations here. Only the two normally distributed dependent variables were included in the multivariate analysis MANOVA and MANCOVA [24] : teen pregnancy and teen birth rates.
We tested for homogeneity of error variances Levene's Test and for equality of covariance matrices Box test between groups. For MANCOVA we report the estimated marginal means of teen pregnancy and birth rates i.
means after the influence of covariates was removed. For pairwise comparison between abstinence levels, we used the Bonferroni adjustment for multiple comparisons. Among the 48 states in this analysis all U. Inlevel 0 states had an average ± standard error teen pregnancy rate of does not cause abstinence behavior.
To the contrary, teens in states that prescribe more abstinence education are actually more likely to become pregnant Figure 2, sex education research papers. Top panel: Teen pregnancies [outliers: 28 Nevada and 29 New Hampshire]; Middle panel: Teen abortions [outlier: 32 New York]; Bottom panel: Teen births. All outliers were included in the statistical analyses. A multivariate analysis of teen pregnancy and birth rates identified the level of abstinence education as a significant influence on teen pregnancy and birth rates across states.
Socio-economic status, educational attainment, and ethnic differences across states exhibited significant correlations with some variables in our model Table 4.
We examined the influence of each possible confounding factor on our analysis by including them as covariates in several multivariate analyses. However, sex education research papers accounting for the effects of these covariates, the effect of abstinence education on teenage pregnancy and birth rates remained significant Figure 3. A The adjusted median household income significantly influenced teen pregnancy and birth rates, but the level of abstinence education still had a significant influence on teen pregnancy and birth rates after accounting for socioeconomic status.
B Education had a significant influence on teen birth, but not on teen pregnancy rates. After accounting for the influence of teen education, the level of abstinence education still had a significant influence on both teen pregnancy and teen birth rates. C The proportion of white teens but not black teens in the population had a significant influence on teen pregnancy and teen birth rates.
After accounting for this influence, the level of abstinence education still had a significant influence on teen pregnancy and birth rates. For this analysis we focused on the three largest ethnic groups for which data are available: white, black, and Hispanic [12].
Teen pregnancy rates differ across these three ethnic groups. For the 48 states in this analysis, an ethnic breakdown for all three ethnic groups of teen pregnancy and abortion rates was available for 26 states, and of teen birth rates for 43 states. Across this reduced sample of states, teen pregnancy rates averaged Teen birth rates averaged Across all 48 states, abstinence education levels were significantly correlated with the proportions sex education research papers white and black teens in the state populations Table 4.
When we included the proportion of white and black teens in the state populations as covariates in a multivariate analysis evaluated at proportion white: 0. If Medicaid waivers contribute to the positive correlation between abstinence education and teen pregnancy at the state level, then states with waivers should have different teen pregnancy and birth rates than states without waivers.
This was sex education research papers the case. A recent study [14] found the same level of non- significance 0. Access to waivers does not explain the difference in teen pregnancy rates shown are means and ±2 SE in states with a different emphasis on abstinence.
This study used a correlational approach to assess whether abstinence-only education is effective in reducing U. Correlation can be due to causation, but it can also be due to other underlying factors, which need to be examined.
The Abstinence of Essential Information - Advancing Sex Education - KC Miller - TEDxPSU
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Oct 26, · Publishes research on all aspects of sex, sexuality and sex and relationships education, including LGBT education, STI education and homonormativity research Planned Parenthood delivers vital reproductive health care, sex education, and information to millions of people worldwide. Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc. is a registered (c)(3) nonprofit under EIN Aug 22, · Abstinence-only-until-marriage approaches have set back sex education, family planning, and HIV-prevention efforts. Between and , the percentage of schools in the U.S. that require students to learn about human sexuality fell from 67 percent to 48 percent, and requirements for HIV prevention declined from 64 percent to 41 percent
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