Alexandra Butler, University of Utah
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Utah’s policy of abstinence only sexual education is often discussed as a contentious issue. Some worry that, if not taught in school, young people will not obtain accurate information on sex, contraceptives, and sexually transmitted diseases. Others fear that talking about sex will encourage young people to have premarital sex, breaking norms of society. As a result sex education in Utah excludes essential issues like contraceptive use. However, with today’s technology providing easy information access to all matters, including sexuality, is policy concerning sexual education even a relevant concern? The central questions for this project are how young people in Utah today learn about sex, contraceptives, and STI’s, from whom they learn (school, parents, friends, internet etc.) and how accurate and compete is the information they gain. This was done through a series of qualitative open-ended interviews with Utah High School graduates ages 18 and older, equally representing both sexes. Later, answers from the interviews for key questions were coded for quantitative analysis on how Utah teens obtain their sexual education. This project has greater implications concerning what is taught in Utah sexual education classes. If most teens obtain accurate health information from outside sources, then sexual education classes could be utilized to focus on other areas of information, such as relationships. The information from this study may help educators to structure sex education courses in such a way as to fill the gaps and engage students in discussions that are appropriate and relevant for today’s changing society.