Communicating with Confidence: Evaluating Sexual Education Exposure’s Effect on Sexual Communication
Data used from 293 participants aged 18-25 was used to perform descriptive analyses and linear regressions adjusted for significant covariates. Exposure to a comprehensive sexual education curriculum was found to be significantly positively associated with increased sexual communication confidence, while exposure to an abstinence only until marriage curriculum was not found to be a significant predictor. All resources were found to be positively associated with sexual communication confidence with the exception of health class, which was an insignificant predictor.
Comprehensive sexual education is an important factor in increasing young adults’ confidence in sexual communication of information and preferences. However, sexual education delivery in health classes in the United States is currently ineffective. A reevaluation of how sexual education should be delivered in the United States is needed.
Sex education curricula often do not discuss topics of pleasure and pain, thus perpetuating a cycle of stigma within intimate partnerships. This thesis examines the current research surrounding conversations about pleasure and pain within interpersonal relationships and comprehensive sex education curricula. Interviews were conducted with upper-class undergraduate women at Arizona State University about their sex education history and how this impacted their knowledge and perceptions of sexual pleasure and pain. The interviews also focused on how pleasure and pain have impacted a woman’s sexuality and intimacy both personally and with a partner. This study found that women value sexually fulfilling lives with the absence of pain; however, the sex education they were given did not provide them with the confidence or language to discuss pleasure and pain with their partners. These findings allow for recommendations for developmentally appropriate sex education programs that focus on encouragement and teach women to confidently discuss their pleasure and pain with their partners to ensure they feel safe, comfortable, and fulfilled during sex.