NEWS & TRENDS

Teen sex study underscores need for parent involvement, Ross says

Michael Foust for Baptist Press

A recent report showing that nearly one in five young teenagers has had sex highlights the need for increased parental involvement in their children's lives, an expert who helped found the True Love Waits abstinence campaign said.

The report by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy found that 18-19 percent of teens age 14 or younger have had sex and that only 30 percent of parents of sexually active 14-year-olds believe their child had engaged in sex.

Richard Ross, a spokesperson for the True Love Waits abstinence campaign, said the report underscores the need for parental involvement in teens' lives. Ross is professor of student ministry at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas.

"Far too many parents are hoping their words and perhaps their example will be enough to positively shape the sexual behavior of their kids," Ross said. "They hope this even while they neglect any kind of relationship with those middle-schoolers. Career advancement, adult social lives, failing marriages and a host of other preoccupations leave the kids stone cold empty inside."

Often, those teens will "ignore the instruction" of their parents and try to fill an emotional void with sex, Ross said.

The report had other troubling findings. About half of 14-year-olds and a third of 12-year-olds said they had been at a party without adult supervision. Also, about a quarter of young teens who date say they have dated someone who is at least two years older. Such relationships, the report says, are much more likely to involve sex.

The report gave a list of recommendations, including increased parent-teen discussion on sex.

"I can applaud that as a positive step," Ross said. "But to assume those conversations alone will change behavior is foolish. Conversations will never have much power until parents reorder their priorities and begin to rebuild heart connections with their own children. Students then will begin to live chaste lives -- not to age 14 -- but to the marriage altar."

The report, which is based on data primarily collected in the last 10 years, is available in a seven-chapter report titled "14 and Younger: The Sexual Behavior of Young Adolescents."

Specifically, the study found:

• About 18-19 percent of 14-year-olds have had sex. The number falls to 10 percent for 13-year-olds and 4-5 percent for 12-year-olds.
• Boys age 14 and younger are "slightly" more likely to have had sex than girls the same age.
• Sexually active teens are more likely to drink alcohol, smoke and use illegal drugs. Forty-three percent of sexually active teens say they have smoked marijuana, compared to only 10 percent of virgins.
• About half of young teens say they have been on a date in the past 18 months.
• Thirty-three percent of young teens who date someone who is three or more years older say the relationship includes sex. When the difference in dating age is two years, the percentage is 26 percent. If the teens are the same age, the number drops to 13 percent.
• Parents and teens disagree on whether they had had a conversation about sex.
• Approximately one in seven sexually active 14-year-olds reports having been pregnant.