According to The Family in America, New Research, a recent study from a researcher at the University of Missouri shed light on the reasons why teenagers chose to remain abstinent, rather than engaging in premarital sex.

While the percentage of kids in the U.S. engaging in sex before marriage is still staggering, it is also a minority--52% of teens are not sexually active, according to the Youth Risk Behavior Survey for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

That fact led researcher Lynn Blinn-Pike to ask why some kids resisted the temptation to have sex. In Family Relations, Blinn-Pike said "more emphasis has been placed on understanding adolescents who report they have had sex than on understanding adolescents who report they have remained abstinent." Such teenagers were "sexually resilient," she said, since they have weathered "peer and media messages that make early sexual behavior appear attractive and normal."

Why were these teens resisting? A survey of nearly 700 abstinent Missouri kids grades 8 through 10 revealed a number of major categories of explanations. The most common reason given was fear of the consequences of premarital sex, such as pregnancy, disease or punishment from parents.

The next most frequent response was "conservative values" based in religious objections to sex outside marriage. Like other studies on the subject, kids who lived with both parents were more likely to credit conservative beliefs than those who lived in some other familial arrangement.

Both of these explanations give credence to a growing number of studies which show that parents who are involved in their kids' lives, and who confidently transmit their religious and moral values to their children, have the greatest success in preventing risky and immoral behavior.

Source: The Family in America, New Research, 11/99

© Copyright 2000 · American Family Association, all rights reserved.

© © Copyright 2000 · American Family Association, all rights reserved.