Although more and more reproductive health interventions in the South-West Indian Ocean, including those targeting adolescents, are performed on a regional basis, information on sexual initiation is scattered and difficult to compare. This study used unique qualitative data from 116 focus groups conducted in 2007 among in-school and out-of-school, younger and older, male and female adolescents ...

Purpose: We aimed to reveal the association between cognitive social capital and sexual awareness among high school students in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, where adolescent premarital sex is considered to be wide-spreading as consequence of socioeconomic changes, in comparison to our previous study in Hanoi, 2012. Methods: We conducted a questionnaire-based survey and a cross sectional study in ...

715 The liberal northeastern state of Maine has decided not to accept federal funding for school sex education because the federal programme requires teachers to promote abstinence until marriage and mutual faithfulness afterwards rather than provide comprehensive sex education. California and Pennsylvania have also rejected funding for abstinence only sex education. The American Civil Libertie...

This research examined the association of having a tattoo and engaging in premarital sexual intercourse. Data gathered from a convenience sample of 450 college students indicated that tattooed respondents were substantively and significantly more likely to be sexually active than nontattooed college students. Tattooed men became sexually active at a significantly earlier age than nontattooed me...

OBJECTIVES To gain insight into the context of sexual abstinence and identify potential determinants of abstinence in this population. DESIGN Four focus groups. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING Twenty-four, predominantly African American (88%) girls aged 14 to 19 years were recruited from urban health centers and youth development programs in Rochester, New York, between September and December 2006...

BACKGROUND Despite liberalization of the Nepal abortion law, young women continue to experience barriers to safe abortion services. We hypothesize that marital status may differentially impact such barriers, given the societal context of Nepal. METHODS We evaluated differences in reproductive knowledge and attitudes by marital status with a probability-based, cross-sectional survey of young w...

The age of menarche among Indian girls, which is reported to be declining, ranges from 11.5–14.5 years, with the current average age being 13.5 years. This has resulted in earlier onset of puberty and secondary sex characteristics, and increased reproductive exposure. (Bhatia,1993) With sexual maturation taking place earlier and the age of marriage delayed, the period of non-marital fecundity, ...

BACKGROUND School-based sex education is an effective medium to convey health information and skills about preventing sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and unwanted pregnancies among adolescents. However, research on school-based sex education is limited in many developing countries, including Nepal. This study thus had two main objectives: (1) to assess students' evaluation of school-base...