In response to public pressure, the Department of Health and Human Services has disclosed a taxpayer-funded study that reflects positively on abstinence education, having first kept the full study under wraps while funding for such programs was slashed.
The National Survey of Adolescents and Their Parents in 2008 found that about 70 percent of parents agreed with the statement, "It is against your values for your adolescent to have sexual intercourse before marriage," as well as "Having sexual intercourse is something only married people should do." A majority of adolescents in the survey responded similarly.
Though the survey was presented at two conferences last year, when Lisa Rue, a researcher at the University of Northern Colorado, asked for a copy of the full survey, her request was denied. She tried again, the second time filing under the Freedom of Information Act. That request also was denied.
"The second denial from the Obama administration leaves me to reflect on the role of cultural values with regard to prevention science," Rue wrote in an editorial. "If we are truly interested in learning how to prevent two critical epidemics currently devastating our country (out-of-wedlock child bearing and sexually transmitted infections), then the nationally representative findings provide momentum and support for accessing cultural values of parents and children which promote optimal health choices for adolescents."
Valerie Huber, executive director of the National Abstinence Education Association, as well as pro-family news outlets called on concerned citizens to submit a Freedom of Information Act request to view the full study. The response was so vast that the HHS website reportedly was temporarily down Aug. 20. By the evening of Aug. 23, the full study was posted on the HHS website.
The NAEA said the episode calls into question whether the recent sex education policy decisions by the current administration and Congress truly reflect cultural norms or clear evidence-based trends.
"We are greatly concerned that the sex education policy being implemented by this administration does not reflect the values of what most parents and teens clearly want," Huber said Aug. 24.
Congress and the administration cut all abstinence-centered program grants from the 2010 budget, and funding for 176 abstinence programs is set to expire Sept. 30. Nearly 2 million students in those programs will be put at risk, the NAEA said.
"Our state has the highest teen pregnancy rate in the nation," said Larry McAdoo, executive director of an abstinence program in Mississippi that will lose funding. "I do not understand why our services to needy teens would be cut short. Mississippi's teens need more resources, not less.
"Our abstinence program equips youth with the skills necessary to make healthy choices. Soon, however, Mississippi's youth will be left without any resources to counter the sexual messages with which they are continually bombarded."
Among additional results of the study:
-- General parent views about sex and abstinence were more conservative among blacks, Hispanics, parents from lower-income households and parents attending religious services more frequently.
-- The majority of parents surveyed favored their adolescents receiving abstinence messages from multiple sources. Ordered from most preferred to least preferred, parents favored abstinence messages delivered at a place of worship (85 percent), a doctor's office or health center (85 percent), school (83 percent), a community organization (71 percent) and the Internet (55 percent).
-- Adolescent frequency of attending religious services was strongly associated with more conservative general views about sex and abstinence among adolescents, as well as more restrictive views about their own sexual behavior.
-- Adolescent exposure to some specific topics related to sex and abstinence in a class or program appeared to increase the likelihood that adolescents heard and reported similar messages about sex and abstinence delivered by their parents.
"It is important that the representative government reflects the desires of its constituents," Huber said. "This study's findings call for a reinstatement of funding for abstinence education within the next fiscal budget."
President Obama's budget for 2010 replaced abstinence education programs with so-called comprehensive sex education programs that promote the use of condoms and other contraceptives among the nation's teenagers.
Contact: Erin Roach
