Contraception use on the rise as more teens delay sex: Study

[kpete]

Source: Raw Story/AFP

More US teenagers are postponing sex than in 1995, and hormonal contraceptive use is up among those who are sexually active, said US health authorities on Thursday.

However, disparities in safe sex practices remain, with white teenagers more likely to regularly use contraception than African-Americans or Hispanics, said the report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The data came from the National Survey of Family Growth collected for 1995, 2002, and the period of 2006-2010, described as a nationally representative survey.


Over the period 2006-2010, 57 percent of teenage girls aged 15-19 years had never had vaginal intercourse, an increase from 49 percent in 1995, said the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly report.

Read more: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/05/03/contraception-use-on-the-rise-as-more-teens-delay-sex-study/

[Myrina]

1. Misleading stats.

" ... never had vaginal intercourse ..."

Well, that still leaves a whole lot of options to qualify one as 'sexually active', now, doesn't it?

[happyslug]

3. Sex surveys are notoriusly inaccurate

Most people will tell what they expect the survey taker wants to hear. Given that in most cases people are most honest with older women (i.e. people are less likely to lie to their mother or a woman of the same age) most survey takers tend to be middle age women. In most cases these survey takers get the most accurate results, the problem is what teenager wants to admit to their mother they having sex? And the related situation, who wants to lie to their friends taking the same survey know they are NOT having sex? (i.e. the teenager wants to show she is popular with the other sex by bragging how many times she has had sex. especially if the survey is done in a mall with teens being asked while they are in the mall with their girlfriends).

Either way, you have an inherent error in the survey, and the two errors do NOT off set each other (i.e. in 2000 more teenagers may have wanted to show how popular they were, while in 2012, the trend may be to claim they are doing they best to avoid sexually transmitted diseases). Thus sex surveys have high error rates do to people lying thus both sets of surveys are of questionable reliability.

[caseymoz]

4. Most people also have illusions about themselves

. . . and their behavior. But either way, sex surveys are wildly inaccurate.

But one thing that suggests at least part of these findings are true: the rate of teen pregnancies have been falling since the late '90s.

[happyslug]

8. Every time I hear about the drop in teenage prenancy, 1990 era joke of why

Bill Clinton was out of circulation....

It is an old and bad joke, but I can help myself repeating it.

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. Since this from the National Survey of Family Growth, vaginal intercourse is what counts

because that's how you get a family. It would be stylistically awkward to constantly qualify the sex as 'vaginal' all the way through the article. You can see the point of the article is talking about the chances of getting pregnant - much of it is about contraception, and it goes on to talk about the teen birth rate.

The stats are not misleading; but if you quote just a small part of the article, they could seem misleading.

[Iliyah]

2. That makes absotuley

no sense, pleasseeeeeeeee, what kind of bullshit is this?

[muriel_volestrangler]

5. Which bit don't you understand?

The numbers of teens who have had (vaginal) sex has decreased a bit.

Pill, IUD and injection forms of contraception have become more common. Condom use has decreased somewhat.

So, given those pieces of information, you won't be surprised at the final thing talked about in the article: the teen birth rate has declined significantly.

So, what "makes absolutely no sense"? What do you think is "bullshit"?

[Vogon_Glory]

7. Unacceptable Trend! Radical Righties Will Have To Reverse It!

WHAT!? Teens are having sex before marriage and they aren't getting pregnant or suffering massive STD epidemics?

Unacceptable! Something MUST be done to punish those teens not only for having sex out of holy wedlock, but for having sex without the intention of making babies!

Well, obviously restricting abortion doesn't do the job! Tougher measures are needed! Close Planned Parenthood clinics! Force pharmacies to stop distributing birth control! Make those commie-lib heathen children PAY the bitter consequences for giving into their ungodly lust so the new Amurrican "Christian" Theo-public can make itself manifest to the rest of the world!