US sex-abstinence classes queried

[Ray]

US sex-abstinence classes queried

By Vanessa Heaney
BBC News, Washington

Couple hugging

The US government warned not to draw sweeping conclusions
US students attending sexual abstinence classes are no more likely to abstain from sex than those who do not, according to a new study.

Participants in special programmes were just as likely to have sex a few years later as those who did not attend.

In the past few years of Republican Party control of Congress, the spending on no-sex-before-marriage education has risen from $10m to $176m a year.

Critics have repeatedly said the programmes are not working.

They say the money would be better off spent on a comprehensive sex education that would include abstinence.

Conclusions

Social conservatives have long believed that teaching adolescents about sexuality and contraception could encourage them to have sex.

They would rather promote abstinence until marriage.

The students in this study, which was ordered by Congress, came from a range of big cities across the United States, such as Milwaukee and Miami and from rural communities in Virginia and Mississippi.

They were 11 and 12 years old when they entered the abstinence programmes, which lasted one to two years.

The researchers also looked at the behaviour of their peers from the same communities who did not attend the classes.
The findings show that those who attended first had sex at about the same age as their peers - at 14 years and nine months.

The Bush administration has warned against drawing sweeping conclusions from the study.

BBC NEWS | Americas | US sex-abstinence classes queried

What was the aim behind these classes?

So, it is not working!

Did anyone ever feel it would work?

I wonder.

But worth a try?

[bandwagon]

Did anyone ever feel it would work?

Not me. The evidence is out there: attitudes and values cannot be taught. They are acquired from one's peers. More accurately, specific values and attitudes are acquired from peer groups that one identifies with and in which those particular values are salient. There is also a heavy genetic influence through personality type.

However this is so against the "nurture" paradigm that has ruled during the 20thC -and on which a whole industry of psychoanalyis and parent blame is based-, that it is largely ignored, even villified.

If someone could work out how to change the prevailing values and attitudes (and hence behaviour) in individual peer groups/ cliques, we would have the key not just to sexual promiscuity, but also crime, drug and alcohol use, home grown terrorism, as well as achievement at school.

The notion of abstention is therefore readily absorbed by individuals in church-based peer groups.

For the same reason teaching individual adolescents about sexuality and contraception in a sensible way does not per se encourage them to have sex. However, care would need to be taken to avoid encouraging the notion within the groups that having sex is cool[/QUOTE]

[THL]

I personally do not think that schools should be teaching sex-ed at all, I think it is up to the parents, but since so many parents won't do it - It is left up to the schools.

That being said, I think that since it is being left up to the schools then they should teach abstinence as well as STD and pregnancy prevention. The schools can maybe get som kids to wait and the others will at least have a better idea of how to be a little bit safer about things.

[Bigfella]

Ray,

I'm in the 'didn't think it would work' category. As bandwagon pointed out, sexual behaviour is influenced by a lot of factors, and the most powerful ones tend to be to do with peer groups & social expectations (and a bit of good old fashioned biology).

I have no problem with schools teaching sex ed and I have no problem with abstinence being integrated into a well rounded approach to the subject. It is a fascinating irony that for many years in Australia the state of Queensland was the only state that did not have sex ed (our curricula are state controlled). It was also the state with the highest rate of teen pregnancy.

On a more serious note, the most successful anti-AIDS programs in Africa have been those such as Uganda's 'ABC' program, promoting 'Abstinence, Be faithful, use a Condom if you aren't'. In a neighbouring country (forget which) a program teaching abstinence only to teens actually resulted in a rise in the far more dangerous practice of anal sex among teens, as the key measure of abstinence was female virginity.

Unfortunately programs such as Uganda's are under attack from church groups. Some Catholic bishops & priests in Africa tell their congregations that condoms don't work, a distortion of truth that bordes on evil to my mind. Evanglical denominations, many based in America, have put pressure on the current administration not to fund programs that either don't teach abstinence, or in some cases simply do teach about contraception. In Uganda itself the wife of the current President (or PM - government leader, anyhow) is an evangelical, and is in the process of replacing ABC programs with 'A' only programs.

I'll try to dig up links if anyone is interested.

[Bluesman]

The evidence is out there: attitudes and values cannot be taught.

Can't they? You sure 'bout dat? Your experience with parenting teach you that? If so, how vast is that experience, anyway? Raised up a passle o' young'uns yourself, have you, but you weren't able to imprint any values on 'em? Well, if that's the case, may I gently suggest that you may not have been going about it very effectively, as MY experience has shown me that everything a parent DOES imprints on the kids, whether it was supposed to or not, and if your progeny ain't got them ole values and attitudes that you were hoping they would, well, maybe you were communicating something other than what you'd intended. Nevertheless...they learned from you, alright.

If you'd like, you can call me and I'll let you speak to three reasons why I believe you're wrong.

OF COURSE values and attitudes can be taught. What's more, they NEED to be taught.

[bandwagon]

Raised up a passle o' young'uns yourself, have you, but you weren't able to imprint any values on 'em? Well, if that's the case, may I gently suggest that you may not have been going about it very effectively,

Bluesman

Once more you’re jumping to entirely the wrong conclusion. (Once more I think this is deliberate for the purposes of goading).

I ‘ve got 4 boys aged 17, 15 and 11 (twins) each one of them delightful, (not just according to their parents, but also their teachers, friends and their friends' parents), outward looking, empathic (remarkably for teenagers) and conscientious, whilst not pushovers. Whilst it’s damn hard to get them to tidy up, I can be 100% confident that none of them would ever be found swinging from a chandelier. I can hand them a large bank note for shopping and be confident that I get the right change back (unlike the large unauthorised “commissions” I used to take when I was a kid). It’s still too early to get a complete sense of the values and attitudes they will take into adulthood, but I have no worries whatsoever.

Thing is, we did not specifically set about “teaching” them any values. We set certain boundaries of behaviour at home when they were toddlers, (though these were wide) but apart from that we just kinda “sat back and watched” as they developed. I suppose we were always ready to jump in if any of them appeared to be going off the rails.

One notable thing is that looking at the groups of friends they hung out with from an early age were similar in outlook. Teachers have commented that their particular year groups have been a delight to teach, and this is not so for some of the other years. Interesting that the latter comments were applied to “year groups”, furthermore the cause was certain smaller groups within the year group.

Of course you may well argue that we “imprinted" values and attitudes inadvertently, just through our own talk and behaviour. That is hard to deny, but just as hard to prove.

What we do pass on to them is genes, - personality characteristics. But note this includes a whole host of predispositions, including political leanings, inherent moral construct, religiosity (not the content of religion itself), which in turn act as magnets for certain values. It would be easy to assume –as everyone has for the past century – that these values are acquired at home.

However, since psychology, and particularly developmental psychology, has been increasingly subjected to scientific rigour, the evidence has amassed that this is not so, (from hard evidence from innumerable twin studies as well as soft evidence from longitudinal observational studies).

Admittedly there are piles of books written from all sides of the argument, which is part of the “nature vs nurture” debate. I have read many of them. Read a review of the evidence in Judith Rich Harris’ “The Nurture Assumption” 1994, and “Human nature and Individuality” 2006. (However if you read only one more book before you die, read Steven Pinker’s “The Blank Slate”, the best book ever written on human nature. No, the best book ever written).


In truth, the evidence has little to say about each individual kid. All it can say is that in a typical population of western kids 50% of the variance in values, attitude and psychological makeup is heritable, 40% is acquired through peer group exposure, 10% is acquired from the home environment. (That last 10% contains traumatic events and abuse). So this is an average. So there could be some kids who are, somehow, little influenced by a peer group, and run mainly on their genes, or they may identify with their family as their “peers”. Another kid from a “good home” may be sucked into a delinquent peer group, which could form the mould for his values 100%. Or a teenager severely traumatised as a small kid may have his psychological makeup largely determined by that home environment, depending on the vulnerability his genetic makeup has given him.

So this paradigm holds that delinquent and criminal families produce delinquent and criminal kids through genes and choice of neighbourhood, rather than upbringing at home. Equally, if you feel your kids have acquired your own decent values, this paradigm would put it down to genes and any steering, deliberate or inadvertent, you provided in choice of peer group.

I must point out that this is still a controversial theory, unsurprisingly, but firmly based on evidence. And having read widely on it I find it persuasive, but I also note how easy it is to misinterpret the evidence from twin studies. I Also note how persuasively the proponents have dealt with the critique (but then, -I was already persuaded).

Although the evidence as presented is robust, it is no cause to ignore your kids. They certainly need love, care and attention. To neglect them may leave them with an increased vulnerability to adverse influences outside the home (my assumption). It certainly affects the relationship with the parents and their happiness at home and their behaviour at home (evidence-based).

I know, I know: “dumbass, everybody knows that parents…etc…etc…” about as much as: “a fertilised ovum is immediately a human being”..

Well shucks Bluesman, there are other viewpoints in the world. At least hold it as a remote possiblity that they may just represent reality more accurately than yours and allow a little respect for that in your life.

[Bluesman]

Well shucks Bluesman, there are other viewpoints in the world. At least hold it as a remote possiblity that they may just represent reality more accurately than yours and allow a little respect for that in your life.

Yeah, I've heard o' them viewpoints; some of 'em aren't even as stupid as blanket assertions that are ridiculous on their very face. THOSE OTHER viewpoints are interesting to me.

All I'm saying is that OF COURSE values and attitudes can be taught; they ARE taught; they NEED to be taught. So, your original sentence that I was commenting on - "The evidence is out there: attitudes and values cannot be taught" - is bunk.

That's all; nothing more or less than that. No attempt to provoke you, no goading going on.

My, but you're a sensitive little flower, aren't you? (Okay, THAT was provocative AND goading. But of course, it was in fun, too, and it doesn't mean a thing.)

Ya big girl, you.

KIDDING. I'm a kidder.

[Bluesman]

Oh, and my sincerest congratulations, Dad. Is there ANYthing in this world as fulfilling as raising great kids? Is there any better purpose in life than improving the world by making people that are incrementally better than yourself, thereby pushing human development forward?

It is the purpose of my life, and I will be successful in exact proportion to the job - the world's most important job - that I do with my kids.

Enjoy the little monstrosities; before you know it, they're going off to be cavalry scouts and rock stars and parents in their own right. But oh...what a great thing it has been - and still is - to be their dad.

I'm glad you know what it's like. I'm glad you're taking your work seriously. This world needs better people.

[Dreadnought]

Sorry just can't abstain...Nobody likes a quiter anyways.

[bandwagon]

All I'm saying is that OF COURSE values and attitudes can be taught; they ARE taught; they NEED to be taught. So, your original sentence that I was commenting on - "The evidence is out there: attitudes and values cannot be taught" - is bunk.

That's all; nothing more or less than that. No attempt to provoke you, no goading going on.

Obviously it wasn't this, but your immediate presumption that I had failed to bring up kids with values that was goading.

I am glad you feel you can teach your kids values.

I would also take note of who they hang out with. That just might be more important, apparently.

If they turn out OK who cares how that happened.

[bonehead]

Ray,
Lets just say that, with few exceptions, the fruit does not fall far from the tree. What the parents do is a good indication what the offspring will be doing. As a society, we have not been good teachers to our kids. The, "do as I say and not as I do", bs we feed our kids is full of hypocracy and the kids know this. Kids are also hit with influences from many sides. Mass media, culture, peers, etc, and they all say, "JUST DO IT!" As a parent, you can instill your values to your kids, but you can not be with them 24/7 so the decision is ultimately up to the kids.

I understand the idea of preaching abstinence as that once that forbidden fruit is tasted, there is no going back. The reality is that the,"Just do it" message is far more prevailant and is much harder to ignore than the absinance message, when the parents are away, the lights are down and the hormones are raging. Hell, most adults can't handle this temptation so how could we realistically expect our children to be able to handle it.

We need to do some wholesale changes in our society from the top down, ie, we ALL have to chance our behavior, or the abstinance mantra is nothing more than tilting at windmills. As long as out of wedlock sex is condoned and encouraged, real sex education is needed in addition to the option of abstinance.