Teen Sex Education: What You Teach Is What You Get

In a world of growing sexual license and confusion, our children face a bewildering variety of pressures to give themselves to inappropriate behavior. For parents seeking to counter the influence of modern culture on their sons and daughters, there must be support in those places where values are most often formed. Aside from the home and religious institutions, schools provide one of the best opportunities to reinforce strong, positive virtues that include chastity and self-control. Instead, they have, in many cases, become a chief battlefield in the fight for the moral ground on which our children will walk. What are the elements of the conflict, and what can we do to influence the outcome? These questions are the subject of this backgrounder on sex education.

What Today's Teen Faces: Some Data on the Social and Sexual Environment which Confronts our Children

Absence of parental influence in children's lives:

• 16.4 children of every 1,000 were affected by divorce in 1988 alone.¹
• 13.7 million children live in single, female-headed homes in 1989 (up 170 percent from 1960).²
• The number of married women in the labor force has quadrupled from approximately seven million to just under 30 million between 1947 and 1984.³
• Parent-child interaction has dropped from 30 hours per week in 1965 to 17 hours per week in 1985.⁴

Powerful media influences:

• Media ranked third in 1980 behind parents and peers in influencing teen values and behavior, up from eighth in 1960.⁵
• Television barrages its viewers with sexual scenes and innuendo -- 35 instances per hour in daytime serials, 24 per hour in situation comedies and 21 per hour in prime time serials.⁶
• 4,079 commercials ran on network television per week in 1981, many using sex to sell their products.⁷
• 24% of adults and 41% of children believe that what they see on television regarding sex is realistic.⁸
• Children listen to an average of 10,500 hours of rock music between grades seven and twelve.⁹

Negative role models:

• Wilt Chamberlain brags of 20,000 sexual conquests; Magic Johnson admitted having over 200 sexual partners.
• Teen television characters like Doogie Howser and those on Beverly Hills 90210 glamorize sexual activity and ridicule chastity.
• 800 sexologists at an international conference said they would not have sex with the partner of their dreams if that person were HIV-positive and using only a condom for protection. These same people routinely recommend condom use to their patients and students.¹⁰

The Tragic Reality of Teen Sexual Activity

The extent of involvement:

• 51.1% of women 15 to 19 years old are now sexually experienced.¹¹
• In Minnesota, with slight differences between Metro and Greater Minnesota, 55% of females and 70% of males reported having intercourse by 12th grade, with one-fourth of females and one-third of males reporting having done so by age 13.¹²
• Sexually active 18-year-old women today have had, on the average, more sexual partners than the present group of 40-year-old women have had to date.¹³

Pregnancy and abortion:

• Over 1 million teen pregnancies occur per year;¹⁴ 4% of sexually active teens in Minnesota report having been pregnant.¹⁵
• There were 8,149 pregnancies among Minnesota teens ages 15-19 in 1991 (5.5% of girls in that age group).¹⁶
• 400,000 of the one million teen pregnancies end in abortion.¹⁷
• There are 322,000 births to unmarried teenagers per year.¹⁸
• Over 2,700 abortions and 5,300 births to Minnesota teens ages 15-19 were reported in 1991.¹⁹

Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STD's):

• 33,000 Americans contract an STD every day;²⁰ 2.5 million teens have an STD;²¹ 63% of STD's occur among people under 25.²²
• 1990 saw 48,000 new cases of syphilis²³ (44 new cases in Minnesota²⁴), and 4 million new cases of chlamydia are now reported annually²⁵ (9,190 reported cases in Minnesota in 1990²⁶).
• 100,000 women are made sterile by gonorrhea in the U.S. every year²⁷ (127 cases of gonococcal pelvic inflammatory disease in Minnesota in 1990).²⁸
• In a study of 1,000 students at the University of Texas, 1 student in 100 was HIV-positive.²⁹
• 903 people age 20-29 in Minnesota are reported to be HIV-positive, having contracted the virus as teens.³⁰

The Solution: Abstinence Education

To help young people resist the flood of negative influences in their lives, we need to uphold the course of choosing to refrain from sexual activity outside of marriage. It is essential to understand that teens can, do, and generally want to say "no" to sexual pressure. This is the premise of abstinence-based education. What constitutes an abstinence curriculum, and what are its benefits?

First of all, the fundamentals: Abstinence is safe, healthy, and secure.

• Sexual abstinence before marriage and heterosexual monogamy within marriage are the only 100 percent safe and effective ways to prevent pregnancy and its consequences of abortion, adoption, or teen parenthood, or to avoid STD's, including AIDS.
• Abstinence provides emotional security. It gives: freedom from pressure to prematurely marry; freedom from exploitation, guilt, worry, and rejection; better communication with friends of the opposite sex; trust in marriage, respect for life, and the chance to enjoy being a teen.³¹

Secondly, young people can and do say "No."

• There is a difference between sexually active and sexually experienced. Sexually experienced may mean a single sexual encounter. Of the 51% of teenaged girls admitting to sexual experience (see above), 21% reported no sexual activity in the three months prior to the survey.³² Therefore, only 40% of these girls were truly sexually active at the time of the survey.
• Of the top 5 percent of junior and senior high school students (6.5 million in 1979-80), 75 percent had never had sexual intercourse.³³
• Eighty percent of 1,200 teens at inner-city Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta wanted to know more about saying "no."³⁴
• Saying that teens cannot control their sexual drive is akin to comparing them to animals and infers that they should expect pre-marital sex as the normal course of events.
• To train young people to say "no" to drugs, or to institute anti-violence courses while assuming that sexual activity is inevitable is, at best, inconsistent and confusing; it is certainly irresponsible.

Thirdly, abstinence education offers positive, realistic content.

• Abstinence education teaches reproductive anatomy and the dangers and consequences of pre-marital sexual activity while teaching the medical and emotional benefits of abstinence.
• It also teaches students how to say "no," how to resist peer pressure, and that sexual drives are controllable.
• It eliminates the mixed messages of the so-called morally neutral curricula by presenting abstinence as the only 100 percent safe and effective way to prevent pregnancy and STD's, not as one of many contraceptive options (We will discuss failure rates of other options later.).
• Some curricula also discuss good study habits and how to avoid involvement with alcohol, drugs, and tobacco.

Fourthly, it respects the developmental process.

• Abstinence education respects the latency period (that time between childhood and mid-adolescence when sexual thoughts and urges are unformed), allowing youth to concentrate on physical and intellectual growth. Child development experts fear that intrusion during this period by non-abstinence-based curricula may lead to harm, including interference with learning, premature sexual involvement, and perversion.
• These curricula also acknowledge that junior and senior high students are in the concrete stage of cognitive development and therefore will not make adult decisions of "healthy sexuality" assumed by neutral decision-making types of programs without a moral framework.
• They also respect natural barriers of modesty between boys and girls, keeping them separated when discussing reproductive anatomy.

Fifthly, it places a strong emphasis on parental involvement.

• Abstinence education respects the fact that parents are children's primary educators.
• Parents cooperate as allies, previewing the material and discussing it with their children at home.

Sixthly, it is appropriate for the public schools.

• The Supreme Court in Bowen vs. Kendrick (1988) upheld the constitutionality of the Adolescent Family Life Act, stating that abstinence education is not religious indoctrination even when organizations with religious affiliation do the teaching.

Finally, it enjoys widespread support

• Abstinence training is mandated in California, Illinois, Texas, Washington, Maryland, and Indiana.
• It is supported by the American Medical Association.

Available Abstinence Programs for the Public Schools³⁵

Sex Respect: The Option of True Sexual Freedom:

• This course has been successfully used by seventh through eleventh graders. Initial funding for the project was in the form of a grant from the Office of Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention (OAPP) through the Adolescent Family Life Act (AFLA). It now includes a high school curriculum called Facing Reality, which contains workbooks for students, parents, and teachers on human sexuality and influences on sexual decision-making, consequences of teen sexual activity, dating guidelines on how to say "no," how to change old patterns of sexual behavior, and responsibilities of parenthood.

  [Contact: Respect, Inc., P.O. Box 349, Bradley, Illinois, 60915, (815) 932-8389 or Project Respect, Committee on the Status of Women, P.O. Box 97, Golf, Illinois, 60029, (312) 729-3298]

AANCHOR (An Alternative National Curriculum for Responsibility):

• The material applies to junior and senior high students. Its development was also supported through OAPP and AFLA.
• It contains six modules: responsibility, ethical thinking, the family, communications, the law, and human reproduction.

  [Contact: Dr. Terrance Olson, Dept. of Family Sciences, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah 84602, (801) 378-2069]

 Me, My World, My Future and Sexuality, Commitment and Family:

• These two courses are for middle schools and high schools, respectively.
• The content: fifteen value-based lessons with parent-student communication sheets covering how to exchange immediate gratification for healthier long-term goals in areas of sexuality, drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. The middle school curriculum uses concrete learning activities. The high school curriculum contains information on risks of various contraceptive methods and contrasts the safety and effectiveness of abstinence. It also discusses the fundamental purpose of marriage.

  [Contact: Teen-Aid, Inc., N. 1330 Calispel, Spokane, Washington 99201, (509) 466-8679]

Measured Results Following on Implementation of Abstinence Programs

Sex Respect has effected clear outcomes in both physical and mental practices:

• In a follow-up study of 3500 students from 26 schools using this curriculum, the pregnancy rate was 5% compared to 9% in the control group and a national average of 10%. Five percent of males in the study caused a pregnancy compared to 7% in the control group.³⁶ Similarly, among 450 students in Lamar, Missouri, over the course of two years there were no reported pregnancies.³⁷
• Attitudes changed significantly: Before the course 36% said sexual intercourse among teens is acceptable, provided no pregnancy resulted; only 18% agreed after the course. Before the course, 20% said that sexual urges are "always" controllable; 39% said so after.³⁸

AANCHOR showed statistically significant differences between students who took the course and those who received the standard curriculum. Changes were noted in the following areas:³⁹

• Higher family strengths (loyalty, emotional support, cohesion);
• More frequent discussion with parents about sexual values and beliefs;
• More abstinent attitudes regarding premarital sexual involvement.

Sexuality, Commitment, and Family:⁴⁰

• After San Marcos High School in California introduced the curricula, the pregnancy rate dropped from 147 per 600 girls in 1984-85 to 20 per 800 in 1986-87.
• Lessons on study skills were also added, and the number of students with low grades dropped by 25%.

Me, My World, My Future had statistically significant changes in attitude in initial testing in the following areas:⁴¹

• More aware of the benefits of sexual abstinence;
• Less likely to engage in intercourse before marriage;
• More likely to feel that teens who had sex would be better off to stop and wait until marriage.

Some Programs Currently being used in Minnesota (not Abstinence Curricula)

Some of the most common series you will find in Minnesota include: Human Sexuality: Values and Choices (Health Start); Changes, Challenges, and Choices (Health Start); AIDS Understanding and Prevention (Merrill Wellness Series); and Developing Responsible Relationships (Glencoe McGraw Hill). What such programs emphasize is often very different from abstinence-based curricula. Some Features:

There are problems with their basic philosophy.

• "Mixed" curricula promote the lie of inevitability of teen sexual behavior (see above under "Young people can and do day 'No'").
• They also teach the myth of "safe sex" (condom use, and so on). Some of the possibly fatal flaws in such thinking include:
  • Some condom facts: The FDA allows 4 condoms per 1000 to leak water and still be sold to the public.⁴² Studies done or published by Planned Parenthood assess the failure rate of condoms to prevent pregnancy (which can only occur one or two days a month) at 18-20%.⁴³ The AIDS virus is approximately 500 times smaller than the human sperm, and can be spread 365 days per year. One study showed that the rate of AIDS transmission from infected husbands to their wives, despite the consistent use of condoms was 17%.⁴⁴ What will it be among teens--notorious for misuse, or non-use, of condoms--in the heat of passion?
  • They don't discuss the problem of deception: According to a study of college students from the New England Journal of Medicine, 34% of men and 10% of women have lied, and 20% of men and 4% women would hide their HIV status in order to have sex.⁴⁵

Abstinence takes a back seat or is, at best, mentioned as one possible option.

• Abstinence is described as another contraceptive option. It is left to the student to decide when they are "ready" for sex and which "responsible" means of contraception they will use.
  • AIDS Understanding and Prevention mentions abstinence after a long discussion of condoms.
  • Developing Responsible Relationships in its four rules of "safe sex" does not mention abstinence at all.
  • Human Sexuality: Values and Choices says, in a graph, abstinence is 100% effective as a birth control option.
  • Changes, Challenges, and Choices calls abstinence a "green light" activity saying that it is "always safe." On the same page, it says that having sex using a condom is a "yellow light" activity -- "maybe safe, maybe not." Given the condom's shortcomings, the possibility of life-threatening diseases, and the developmental level of teens, it this reasonable counsel?

Some specific content and value problems include:

• Precise failure rates of condoms for preventing AIDS and STDs are generally not mentioned in the curricula; they say that condoms are not 100% safe.
• All ways of contracting AIDS are treated as co-equal risks in AIDS Understanding and Prevention. The program ignores the fact that homosexual activity accounts for 66% of AIDS cases and that promiscuous heterosexual activity and intravenous drug use account for another 15% (95% of cases in Minnesota are caused by these three activities).⁴⁶ Thus, the point that behavior matters is minimized.
• There are discussions of masturbation in Values and Choices and Changes, Challenges, and Choices, and anal intercourse in AIDS Understanding a Prevention and Developing Responsible Relationships despite the fact that numerous child psychologists and psychiatrists have expressed concern over the harm that it causes.
• Values and Choices includes what some might consider, for various reasons, an inappropriate video on childbirth.
• Both Values and Choices and Change, Challenges, and Choices in an effort to portray homosexuality as common and normal, cite the homosexual population as 10% (a figure long discredited--most reputable studies put it at 1-4%).

Using standard federally-sponsored and other sex-ed programs is a costly proposition.

• From 1971 to 1986, the government spent $2 billion of taxpayers money. During that same period, the increase in the number of teen-age girls who used contraceptives but became pregnant was 266%; who had abortions, 107%; and who contracted an STD, 93%.⁴⁷
• The states with the highest per capita output for family planning, abortion subsidy, and sex education (California, Hawaii, Georgia, and New York) also had the greatest increases in teen pregnancy and abortion.⁴⁸
• Studies show either no help or actual harm of comprehensive sex education programs.
  • Pediatric researchers James Stout, M.D. and Frank Rivara, M.D. (U. of Washington, Seattle), on five studies involving a wide range of junior and senior high students: "The programs had no discernible impact on pregnancy rates, a negligible effect on using birth control methods, and an insignificant influence on teenagers' decisions about when to engage the first time in sexual intercourse."⁴⁹
  • Researchers William Marsiglio and Frank Mott state, "These models suggest that . . . prior exposure to a sex education course is . . . significantly associated with the initiation of sexual activity at ages 15 and 16."⁵⁰
  • Similarly, Deborah Dawson notes, "Prior contraceptive education increases the odds of starting intercourse at the age of fourteen by a factor of 1.5." (a 50% increase)⁵¹
  • A 50 percent increased likelihood of starting sexual intercourse was also reported in a Lou Harris survey which compared students who had received comprehensive sex education with contraceptive information and those who had received only information about reproductive anatomy and relationships, or no sex education at all (Poll commissioned by Planned Parenthood.).⁵²
  • In the three years after condom distribution began at Adams City HS (Commerce, CO), the birth rate climbed to 31% above the national average.⁵³

How to Evaluate and Act

In considering whether or not a sex-ed. curriculum is appropriate. the following are some concepts to keep in mind:

• First of all, there should be a high level of parental involvement. The program should honor the parents as the primary educators of their children. There should be the opportunity for parents to participate in planning, serving on school committees, attending open public hearings, and previewing materials (be very wary if this is restricted). Parents should also be permitted to sit in on classes. There should be ample occasion for parent-student interaction as part of the curriculum (e.g. shared worksheets).
• Secondly, the content should be appropriate for the grade level of the students. Material must be factual, not speculative or ideologically biased. It should avoid mixed messages that combine abstinence and contraception. It is essential to have classes respect modesty and not teach sensitive subjects in mixed groups or present graphic discussion of sexual acts. The moral tone should be positive, showing the emotional and medical benefits of premarital abstinence and respecting the family, marriage, society, and life.

[Curriculum guidelines for each grade are available from Educational Guidance Institute, Inc., 927 S. Walter Read Dr., Suite 4 Arlington, VA 22204, (703) 486-8313]

REMEMBER, UNDER MINNESOTA LAW, PARENTS HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMOVE THEIR CHILDREN FROM COURSES WHICH TEACH MATERIAL THAT THEY FIND OBJECTIONABLE AND TO ARRANGE ALTERNATIVE INSTRUCTION (MN Statutes 126.667).

Notes:

¹ National Center for Health Statistics, Monthly Vital Statistics Report, Vol. 39, No. 12 [Quoted in Family Research Council, Free to Be Family (Washington, DC, 1992), p. 25].

² Gilbert Crouse, Erosion of the Family: A Statistical Analysis (quoted ibid., p. 23).

³ David Kupelian, Mark Masters, and Gene Antonio, "The Daycare Dilemma: What's a Nation to Do?", in New Dimensions: The Psychology Behind the News, November 1990, p. 18.

⁴ John Robinson, How Americans Use Time: A Social-Psychological Analysis of Everyday Behavior (New York, NY: Prager, 1977), p. 70.

⁵ The Teen Environment, Robert Johnston Co., Inc., 1980, p. 4 [Quoted in Josh McDowell, Myths of Sex Education (San Bernadion, CA: Here's Life Publishers, 1990), p. 38].

⁶ Broadcasting, Feb. 2, 1988, p. 121 (as quoted in ibid., p. 41).

⁷ Randall Alcorn, Christians in the Wake of the Sexual Revolution (Portland, OR: Multnomah Press, 1985), p. 84.

⁸ Louis Harris and Associates, AmericanTeens Speak: Sex, Myth, TV, and Birth Control - The Planned Parenthood Poll, September/October, 1986.

⁹ Stuwart Powell, "What Entertainers are Doing to Our Kids," U.S. News and World Report, October 28, 1985, p. 46.

¹⁰ Theresa Crenshaw, remarks made at the National Conference on HIV, Washington, DC, 11/15-18/87 as quoted in Family Research Council op. cit., p. 80.

¹¹ U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, "National Survey of Family Growth," Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report #40, 1/3/92 (In Family Research Council, op. cit., p. 75).

¹² The State of Adolescent Health in Minnesota, February, 1989, p. 25.

¹³ "Premarital Sexual Experience Among Adolescent Women, US, 1970-88," Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report #39, January 4, 1991, p. 930.

¹⁴ William Bennett, Sex and the Education of Our Children (U.S. Dept. of Education, 1/22/87. Transcript of talk at the National School Board Assoc., quoted in McDowell, op. cit., p. 10.

¹⁵ Adolescent Health Report, op. cit., p. 26.

¹⁶ Pregnancy Outcomes and Pregnancy Rates by Age of Woman: Minnesota Residents 1980-91, Minnesota Dept. of Health, Center for Health Statistics, p. 7.

¹⁷ Bennett, op. cit. See also Perinatal Advocate, 1991.

¹⁸ National Center for Health Statistics, 1990.

¹⁹ Minnesota Dept. of Health, Center for Health Statistics, op. cit., p. 7.

²⁰ Lewis Lork, "Sex with Care," U.S. News and World Report, June 2, 1986. pp. 53-57.

²¹ Anita Manning, "Teens and Sex in the Age of AIDS," USA Today, October 3, 1988, p. 2D.

²² U.S. Dept. of Health/Human Services, 1991 Annual Report of Division of STD/HIV Prevention, (Washington, DC: Centers for Disease Control), p. 13.

²³ Frances Althaus, "An Ounce of Prevention: STD's and Women's Health," Family Planning Perspectives, Vol. 23, July/August, 1991, p. 173

²⁴ Minnesota Dept. of Health, 1991 STD Surveillance Statistics, p. 8.

²⁵ Centers for Disease Control, op. cit., p. 13.

²⁶ 1991 STD Surveillance Statistics, p. 6.

²⁷ Joseph McIlhaney, 1250 Health Care Questions Women Ask (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1985), p. 616, as quoted in Family Research Council, op. cit., p. 78.

²⁸ 1991 STD Surveillance Statistics, p. 7.

²⁹ "1 in 100 Tested at UT Has AIDS Virus," Austin American Statesman, July 14, 1992, quoted in Family Research Council, op. cit., p. 77.

³⁰ Minnesota Dept. of Health, AIDS Epidemiology Unit, Monthly Surveillance Report, January 1, 1993, p. 2.

³¹ McDowell, op. cit., p. 248-268.

³² U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, "Healthy People 200: National Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Objectives," September 1990, p. 197.

³³ Issues, January 1982, p. 9 as quoted in McDowell, op. cit., p. 29.

³⁴ Associated Press, 1/23/84, as quoted in ibid.

³⁵ Dinah Richard, Has Sex Education Failed Our Teenagers? (Pomona, CA: Focus on the Family Publishers, 1990), pp. 54-56.

³⁶ Project Respect, Final Report to the Office of Adolescent Pregnancy Programs, 1985-1990, (Bradley, IL: Respect, Inc., 1991), p. 8.

³⁷ Kinah Richard, telephone interview with School Nurse Nancy Hughes, Lamar Junior High School, Lamar, Missouri, 4/89 as quoted in Richard, op. cit., p. 57.

³⁸ UPI release 1/12/88 and studies compiled by Project Respect for the second-year pilot project as quoted in Final Report (see Note 36).

³⁹ Olson and Wallace, A Sampler of AANCHOR, p. 35 as quoted in ibid., p. 56.

⁴⁰ Joe Diminicantanio (principal) to Le Anna Benn, 10/2/87 as quoted in ibid. p. 57.

⁴¹ Stan Week, et. al., The Teen-Aid Family Life Education Project, December 28, 1988.

⁴² HHS News, June 19, 1987 and FDA, Compliance Policy Guidelines, guide 7124.21, chapter 24, April 10, 1987, p. 1.

⁴³ Mark Hayward and Johichi Yogi, "Contraceptive Failure in the United States: Estimates from the 1982 National Survey of Family Growth," Family Planning Perspectives, Vol. 18, no. 5, September/October, 1986. See also Susan Harlap, et. al., Preventing Pregnancy, Protecting Health, (The Alan Guttmacher Institute, 1991), pp. 36-37.

⁴⁴ Jack Klenk, U.S. Department of Education, presented at National Conference on HIV, Washington, DC, 1987 (as cited by V. Cline, letter to Yvonne Mortenson).

⁴⁵ Susan Cochran and Vicki Mays, letter to the editor, New England Journal of Medicine, March 15, 1990, 322:15.

⁴⁶ Minnesota Dept. of Health, AIDS Epidemiology Unit, "Reported Non-AIDS Cases of HIV Infection," Monthly Surveillance Report, January 1, 1993.

⁴⁷ Congressional Budget Office Report, 1986, as quoted in McDowell, op. cit., p. 129.

⁴⁸ Jaqueline Kasun, Teenage Pregnancy: What Comparisons Among States and Countries Show, as quoted in Richard, op. cit., p. 8-9.

⁴⁹ James Stout, and Frank Rivara, "Schools and Sex Education: Does It Work?," Pediatrics, Vol. 83, 1989, pp. 375-379.

⁵⁰ William Marsiglio, and Frank Mott, "The Impact of Sex Education on Sexual Activity, Contraceptive Use, and Premarital Pregnancy Among American Teenagers," Family Planning Perspectives, Vol. 18, no. 4, July/August, 1986.

⁵¹ Deborah Dawson, "The Effects of Sex Education on Adolescent Behavior," Family Planning Perspectives, Vol. 18, no. 4, July/August, 1986.

⁵² Louis Harris and Associates, American Teens Speak: Sex, Myths, TV, and Birth Control, (Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Inc., 1986).

⁵³ USA Today, as quoted in Andres Tapia, "Abstinence: The Real Choice for Sex Ed," Christianity Today, Fedruary 8, 1993, p. 28.

Research for this backgrounder was conducted and presented by Dr. Karen Effrem, St. Louis Park, MN.

Published by the Minnesota Family Council, 2855 Anthony Lane South, Suite 150, Minneapolis, MN 55418-3265, (612) 789-8811. No restriction on reproduction if not taken out of context. Call, or write, or use our contact us link for information on additional copies. Originally published April 1993.

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