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WEBSITES for Professionals
Advocates for Youth
http://www.advocatesforyouth.org/parentchild.htm
Resources for sex educators and trainers that include lesson plans to provide sex education in the classroom or community as well as an education program that you can use with your clients to enhance parent-child communication.
ETR Resource Center for Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention (ReCAPP)
http://www.etr.org/recapp/column/column200212.htm
Research on parent-child connectedness and resources you can use to train parents to be able to talk about sexuality issues with their teens.
ONLINE ARTICLES for Professionals
Mother’s Influence on Teen Sex: Connections That Promote Postponing Sexual Intercourse, University of Minnesota’s Division of General Pediatrics and Adolescent Health
Blum RW (2002).
The monograph reviews research data that supports parent-child connectedness and offers strategies you can implement.
Note: Look under 2002 Monographs
Parent Child Connectedness: Implications for Research, Interventions, And Positive Impacts on Adolescent Health. (In PDF format)
Lezin N, Rolleri LA, Bean S, Taylor J. (2004).
Comprehensive review of what is known about PCC as a protective factor for a variety of adolescent health outcomes, including the prevention of adolescent pregnancy, STI and HIV. Includes an analysis of which families are most at risk, which could benefit most from interventions, which parenting practices and styles can change and how you can offer interventions.
ONLINE CURRICULA for Professionals
Parent-Child Communication Basics: An Education Program to Enhance Parent-Child Communication
Advocates for Youth
Complete online resource for a 75-minute seminar for parents on parent-child communication. Includes Facilitator’s Manual, sample Participants Packet, Forms and Transparencies, and link for ordering additional materials. Curriculum focuses on effective communication skills and active listening.
TOOLKITS for Professionals
Stop, Listen and Talk about Sex: A Toolkit for Promoting Family Communication (Click on General Education)
ToucanEd Inc.
This toolkit includes information about family communication and why it is important, guidance on how to develop a family communication campaign, and ways to successfully implement a campaign in a community. It contains a curriculum with outlines of six different sessions that health educators can conduct with parents, as well as brochures, inserts, bus ads, newspaper ads, and posters. Highly Recommended.
ARTICLES for Professionals
If you would like to view a copy of any of these articles, contact our Resource Center at 800-428-5438.
Adolescent pregnancy. Teen perspectives on prevention.
Aquilino ML, Bragadottir H. (2000). MCN American Journal of Maternal and Child Nursing. 25(4):192-7.
Qualitative methods and a focus group approach were used to elicit the views of teens concerning effective strategies to prevent pregnancy. Teens were concerned about teen pregnancy, and supported a comprehensive approach to sex education beginning in the early elementary grades, with age and developmentally appropriate content and reinforcement from late grade school through high school. Teens wanted parents and other adults to be involved in helping them understand sexuality and make decisions about sexual behavior.
The protective effects of good parenting on adolescents.
Devore ER, Ginsburg KR. (2005). Current Opinion in Pediatrics. 17(4):460-465.
A review intended to explore recent developments in the literature regarding parenting practices and adolescent development, with a focus on parenting style, parental monitoring, communication, and supervision. Recent scholarship demonstrates the significant, enduring, and protective influence of positive parenting practices on adolescent development. In particular, parental monitoring, open parent-child communication, supervision, and high quality of the parent-child relationship deter involvement in high-risk behavior.
Parent-adolescent communication and sexual risk behaviors among African American adolescent females.
DiClemente RJ, Wingood GM, Crosby R, Cobb BK, Harrington K, Davies SL. (2001). Journal of Pediatrics. 139(3):407-12.
A theory-guided survey and structured interview were administered to 522 sexually active African American females 14 to 18 years old to examine associations between parent-adolescent communication about sex-related topics and the sex-related communication and practices of African American adolescent females with partners, as well as their perceived ability to negotiate safer sex. The findings demonstrate the importance of involving parents in human immunodeficiency virus/sexually transmitted disease and pregnancy prevention efforts directed at female adolescents. Pediatricians and other clinicians can play an important role in making it easier for parents and teens to talk about sex.
Adolescents' reports of parental knowledge of adolescents' use of sexual health services and their reactions to mandated parental notification for prescription contraception.
Jones RK, Purcell A, Singh S, Finer LB. (2005). Journal of the American Medical Association. 293(3):340-8.
This study seeks to determine the extent to which parents are currently aware that their teenage daughters are accessing reproductive health services and how minors would react in the face of mandated parental involvement laws for prescription birth control. Legislation has been proposed that would mandate parental notification for adolescents younger than 18 years (minors) obtaining prescription contraception from federally funded family planning clinics. Study found that most minor adolescent females seeking family planning services report that their parents are aware of their use of services. Most would continue to use clinic services if parental notification were mandated. However, mandated parental notification laws would likely increase risky or unsafe sexual behavior and, in turn, the incidence of adolescent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.
Family involvement, problem and prosocial behavior outcomes of Latino youth.
Kerr MH, Beck K, Shattuck TD, Kattar C, Uriburu D. (2003). American Journal of Health Behavior. 27 Suppl 1:S55-65.
A convenience sample of Latino youth (n = 446) completed an anonymous survey to explore the relations between familial factors and behavioral outcomes in Latino adolescents using a youth development framework. Higher levels of parental monitoring and familial connectedness were consistently associated with less problem-behavior involvement. Sociocultural encouragement was consistently associated with more prosocial-behavior involvement. Article concludes that the family context is critical to the prevention of problem behaviors and the promotion of prosocial behaviors among Latino adolescents.
Family influences on adolescent sexual and contraceptive behavior.
Miller BC. (2002). Journal of Sex Research. 39(1):22-6.
A literature review which discusses that parent-child closeness or connectedness, and parental supervision or regulation of children, in combination with parents’ values against teen intercourse (or unprotected intercourse), decrease the risk of adolescent pregnancy. Studies about parent-child sexual communication and adolescent pregnancy risk are less conclusive, largely because of methodological complexities.
Effect of mandatory parental notification on adolescent girls' use of sexual health care services.
Reddy DM, Fleming R, Swain C. (2002).Journal of the American Medical Association v.288, n.6, 14
This study was conducted to determine the effect of mandatory parental notification for prescribed contraceptives on the use of sexual health care services by adolescent girls. The study concludes that mandatory parental notification would impede girls’ use of sexual health care services, potentially increasing pregnancy and STDs.
The influence of primary caregivers on the sexual behavior of early adolescents.
Rose A, Koo HP, Bhaskar B, Anderson K, White G, Jenkins RR. (2005). Journal of Adolescent Health. 37(2):135-44.
A cross-sectional, self-administered survey conducted with a nonrandom sample of 408 fifth graders and their caregivers to describe rates of sexual intercourse initiation, anticipated level of sexual activity in the next 12 months, and other risk behaviors among fifth graders and to examine parental factors associated with such behaviors. Almost 5% of girls and 17% of boys reported they had engaged in sexual intercourse. Only 34% of girls and 13% of boys said they did not expect to engage in any type of sexual contact in the next 12 months if they were going with someone they "liked a lot." Parental factors associated with fewer risk behaviors included higher levels of monitoring, fewer communication barriers, less permissive attitudes regarding adolescent sexual behavior, higher relationship quality with child, having fewer than five children in the household, higher levels of education, and being employed.
Teenage pregnancy and associated risk behaviors among sexually abused adolescents.
Saewyc EM, Magee LL, Pettingell SE. (2004).Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health. 36(3):98-105.
Previous research suggests a link between adolescent pregnancy and sexual abuse history, but most studies have used clinical samples of females only and single measures of abuse. Associations between pregnancy involvement, risk behaviors and sexual abuse were examined in sexually experienced teenagers from the Minnesota Student Surveys of 1992 (N=29,187) and 1998 (N=25,002). Teenage pregnancy risk is strongly linked to sexual abuse, especially for males and those who have experienced both incest and non-familial abuse. To further reduce the U.S. teenage pregnancy rate, the pregnancy prevention needs of these groups must be adequately addressed.
BOOKS for Professionals
If you would like to borrow this book, contact our Resource Center at 800-428-5438.
Talking Sexuality: Parent-Adolescent Communication : New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development
S. Shirley Feldman (Editor) & Doreen A. Rosenthal (Editor)
Jossey-Bass, 2002
ISBN: 0787963259
Critically examines the assumption that parental communication plays an important role in helping children make good sexual decisions and act on them. Expands on earlier reviews by proposing a theoretical framework in a field that has largely been notable for its atheoretical approach, by providing methodological alternatives, by going beyond the expert-novice perspective to address communication from the young person's point of view, and by evaluating interventions designed to help parents become better communicators about this difficult, sensitive, and complex topic. Also presents new empirical work on the neglected topics of fathers’ involvement in sex-related communications with their children and teen-initiated communications by gay youth as they inform their parents about their sexual orientation.