Abstinence-Only Sexuality Education Proven to Work? Not So Fast!
There has recently been a lot of media attention around a new study comparing different methods of sexuality education. Many people are claiming that this study provides scientific evidence for the efficacy of both abstinence-only and abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. However, such claims are misleading. This study does not challenge the large body of evidence showing that the abstinence-only-until-marriage programs championed by the Bush administration are ineffective.
First, this single study is relatively small, examining 662 African-American students in sixth and seventh grades. An article in the Huffington Post noted that the results were based on the students’ self-reporting, a method that is inherently flawed, as the students could have reported only what they thought the researchers wanted to hear. Not only would the study’s results need to be replicated for any sweeping claims about the value of abstinence-only education to be accurate, but a similar study would need to be carried out among older students and among students in different ethnic groups.
The study’s findings have also been overstated. The researchers did not compare abstinence-only to comprehensive sexuality education programs, but rather compared different kinds of sexuality education programs to a health education program that did not discuss sexuality. The students in the study were randomly assigned to five different groups: abstinence-only, 8-hour comprehensive, 12-hour comprehensive, safer-sex only, and health education, and the health education group served as a control group to which all the other groups were compared. The most frequently quoted result – that significantly fewer of the abstinence-only students started having sex in the 24 months following the sexuality education classes – was based on a comparison between abstinence-only and health education students, not between abstinence-only and any of the other sexuality education students. Less often reported is that students in the comprehensive classes were less likely to report having multiple sexual partners than students in the health education group. The results of the study, therefore, are both more nuanced and less powerful than they have been made out to be.
It is absurd to argue that this study validates the use of abstinence-only-until-marriage programs over the last decade, as the curriculum employed in the study was inherently different than the curricula supported under the Bush administration. According to the Guttmacher Institute’s review of the study, the abstinence-only program used in the study would in no way meet federal criteria for such programs. As a New York Times editorial from February 8th points out, federally funded abstinence-only programs advocate abstinence until marriage, but the students in the study were taught to remain abstinent until they were ready to handle the responsibilities inherent in having sex. Additionally, the program employed in the study - unlike many federally funded abstinence-only-until-marriage programs - avoided taking a moralistic or negative tone towards sex, and explicitly instructed facilitators “not to disparage the efficacy of condoms or allow the view that condoms are ineffective to go uncorrected.”
There is still one question that few articles address: what should be the aim of sexuality education in the first place? As the Huffington Post article points out, “Sex educators will be the first to say that abstinence is a critical and necessary part of comprehensive sex education efforts,” but that exhortations to abstain hardly form a complete education. Similarly, the Guttmacher Institute report argues that preventing younger kids from having sex is important, but that “it is likewise important to prepare students for the time when they do become sexually active.”
The National Institute for Reproductive Health supports comprehensive sexuality education that not only delays the onset of sexual activity for younger kids, but also teaches kids the skills they need for a healthy sexual life.
By Sasha Albert, Sexuality Education Project Intern