There has been little scientific evidence to suggest that abstinence-only-until-marriage education programs are effective in preventing or reducing teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease. There is also little scientific evidence to suggest that comprehensive sex education programs are as or more effective in preventing or reducing teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease than their abstinence-only counterpart. The following study compares the teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease rates among minors in Virginia that participate in abstinence-only programs with rates among minors participating in comprehensive sex education programs. I hypothesize that counties implementing comprehensive sex education programs in schools will typically have lower pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease rates among minors than counties implementing abstinence-only education programs. I test these hypotheses with data on the 16 Virginia counties and county equivalents which could be verified as having either comprehensive or abstinence-only sex education programs in public schools during 1998-2003. The data confirm the hypotheses. On average, comprehensive program counties showed greater declines in pregnancy rates among females aged 15-17 than abstinence-only program counties. Comprehensive counties experienced declines in Chlamydia and Gonorrhea rates among males and females aged 15-17, whereas abstinence-only counties' Gonorrhea and Chlamydia rates increased. These findings underscore the need for statewide -- indeed, nationwide -- public reporting of school systems' sex education program types to permit a more thorough comparison and evaluation of program outcomes. In the meantime, these results challenge Virginia advocates of abstinence-only education programs to empirically defend their claims. / Master of Science

Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and unplanned pregnancy are significant public health concerns. Abstinence-only until marriage (AOUM) and abstinence pledge programs have received a significant amount of government funding in an attempt to address these problems. Despite receiving over two billion dollars in funding, the programs have not been shown to be effective in achieving their stated goals. In addition, there are significant concerns about the content of AOUM curriculums, including medical inaccuracy and use of outdated gender stereotypes.

Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and unplanned pregnancy are significant public health concerns. Abstinence-only until marriage (AOUM) and abstinence pledge programs have received a significant amount of government funding in an attempt to address these problems. Despite receiving over two billion dollars in funding, the programs have not been shown to be effective in achieving their stated goals. In addition, there are significant concerns about the content of AOUM curriculums, including medical inaccuracy and use of outdated gender stereotypes.

Sexual education has been a much-debated topic in the United States since it was instated in light of the HIV/AID pandemic of the 1980s. The debate has always centered on the role of sexual education: should it act to objectively relay the facts about sexual health? Or should it be utilized as a moral purveyor of teen’s sexual behavior? During the second Bush Administration it seemed as if the conservative right had won and sexual education adopted a role policing teen’s morality with $1.5 billion in federal funding for abstinence-only education. This study aims to provide evidence against abstinence-only education by highlighting its ineffectiveness to meet its own standards of success (preventing teen pregnancy and STI infection), as well as its violation of legal human rights standards. As well, this study will provide an alternative to abstinence-only education, comprehensive sexual education, which provides students with accurate information about sexual health (including information about contraception, abortion, etc.) while still emphasizing abstinence as the preferred sexual behavior in teens.

Based on the various changes in sexual education, many schools throughout the United States still teach abstinence-only education. There is a plethora of literature on the effectiveness of sexual education programs as well as adolescent sexual practices. However, there is a deep gap in literature on students' perspectives of their sexual education and the possible effects it has on their experiences while in college. Therefore, this phenomenological study aims to explore and describe the essence of the experience female university students have regarding the abstinence-only education they received during secondary schooling. The informants (n=12) were 19-22 year old female university undergraduate students who received abstinence-only education within their middle and/or high school. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews. Data was analyzed through a phenomenological approach where themes and sub-themes emerged. The results from this study indicate that no matter what the participants’ personal beliefs and values surrounding sex are, their abstinence-only sexual education did not teach them adequate information for their secondary school years nor to prepare them for their time in a university setting.

This project studies the theological legacy of white evangelical purity culture (WEPC) and proposes a constructive Baptist practical theology of baptism in response. It foregrounds the activism and testimonies of Christian women to foment and intervene in white supremacist constructions of womanhood in the Female Moral Reform movement; to perpetuate and prevent racial violence in the lynching era through the deployment of a reimagined vision of sacred white womanhood; and to expand conceptions of the wounding legacies, persisting challenges, and alternative visions proposed by those harmed by WEPC. In the “afterlife” of white evangelical purity culture, baptism, conceived as a practice of solidarity, is a critical intervention to the persistent and problematic deformations of identity, salvation, and ecclesial formation. The project begins with analysis of the theopolitical history of WEPC and its founding frameworks and promises. It then turns to the Female Moral Reform movement, and particularly the activism and theological arguments of Sarah Grimké and a dissenting interlocutor in 1838, to illustrate how questions of womanhood, race, and women’s rights were forged in the context of institutional slavery. Next, this project engages the activism of Rebecca Felton, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, and the Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching, attends to the character de/formations deployed in women’s activism and rhetoric supportive of and against lynching, and argues that the uninterrogated sacred status of white womanhood prevents a full acknowledgement and dismantling of the regnant theological frameworks of WEPC. It then frames the online writing as testimonies to the wounding experiences in WEPC, offering an emergent tripartite framework of shame, misplaced blame, and silence to capture the impact of WEPC. Finally, drawing from the works of James Wm. McClendon, Jr., Ada María Isasi-Díaz and M. Shawn Copeland, it proposes a Baptist theology of baptism wherein baptism is revelatory rite that initiates solidarity in the service of a world that engenders the possibility of mutual liberation and human flourishing. This project contributes to the growing literature on WEPC by exposing the raced theological scaffolding that necessitate a transformation of core Christian practices. / 2022-12-09T00:00:00Z

To investigate how federal discourse constructs adolescence, the author analyzed discussions of abstinence-only sexuality education from the U.S. Congressional Record from 2001 to 2007. He used grounded theory methodology to identify theoretical codes and construct a model from the data. The grounded theory developed focused on Congress’s maintenance of its role in mediating concern over the sexual behavior of adolescents as opposed to finding a solution to the problem it had identified. The author relates this theory to Foucault’s (1974/1991) concept of governmentality. He discusses Congress’s discourse about adolescence using Lesko’s (2001) confident characteristics of adolescence as a framework.

Sexuality education in public schools in the United States excludes a large population of students. These exclusions are due to a long history of legal and economic battles, as well as the politicized nature of adolescent sexuality. This critical interpretive inquiry explored the long history of sexuality education through the lens of economics, law, and psychological paradigms and examined the way in which each of these lenses furthered the exclusion of nonheterosexual males in curricula. Using a framework comprised of critical feminist theory, critical pedagogy, and queer theory, this manuscript provides an understanding of the social structures of sexuality education and how they continue to marginalize students labeled as “other.” Using critical discourse analysis, this study reviewed legal and political documents, state and private curricula, and works in the sociology and psychology fields. The outcomes of interpretive research do not lend themselves to specific answers, but to a greater understanding of the experience of marginalized individuals and the structures in place that keep this experience intact. Through a critical review of current programming initiatives, recommendations are made to continue moving toward a more gender- and identity-inclusive sexuality education curriculum. These recommendations, which are grounded in current legal and economic requirements, include teacher certification requirements, implementation of the Advocates for Youth 3Rs curriculum, utilization of a rights-based approach to program design, and adoption of national sexuality education by the Department of Health and Human Services, rather than by the Department of Education.

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Research indicates nearly one-fourth of college women fall victim to sexual assault (Cantor et. al., 2015). Two predictors of high proclivity to rape are endorsement of rape myths and adherence to traditional gender norms (King & Roberts, 2011). Additionally, research shows school-based sex education in the United States presents gender and sexual norms in troubling ways that disproportionately harm women (Kendall, 2013). However, research on sexual assault and rape myths have not examined the impact school-based sex education has on rape supportive attitudes. This study aimed to bridge that gap by using original survey data from undergraduate students at a large public university. Analyses indicate sex education has an inconsistent impact on rape myth acceptance; additionally, seeking sexual health information online was found to significantly lower endorsement of rape myths. Study outcomes suggest that further research is needed to explore the relationship between sex education curricula and rape supportive attitudes.