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Titre
What do Spanish adolescents know (or not know) about sexuality? An exploratory study
Autor(es)
Sujet
Adolescence
Sexuality
Sexual knowledge
Sexual education
Health
Fecha de publicación
2019
Resumen
This paper explores Spanish adolescents’ knowledge of six
dimensions of human sexuality: anatomy and sexual physiology;
sexual health; sexual behavior and human sexual response;
affection and sexuality; sexual identity; and sexuality and society.
A questionnaire to evaluate their knowledge was administered to
a sample of 3853 adolescents aged between 12 and 18 (M = 14.40,
SD = 1.44) from 38 secondary schools throughout Castile and Leon
(Spain). The results show that adolescents of both genders, mainly
those enrolled in lower-secondary education levels, tend to be
misinformed about sexuality. Taking into account all the analyzed
dimensions, results reveal that adolescents’ knowledge of sexual
identity is significantly greater than that of sexuality and society,
or of anatomy and sexual physiology. In addition, women show
more detailed knowledge than men, although the margin
between genders is quite small. Finally, this work highlights the
need for sexual education in order to promote more thorough
scientific knowledge of sexuality among Spanish adolescents.
URI
ISSN
1367-6261
DOI
10.1080/13676261.2019.1571176
Versión del editor
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