Teen sexual abstinence pledge

Yet most break their pledges, engaging in first intercourse before marriage. The extant literature reports few differences between pledge breakers and nonpledgers in sexually transmitted infections and nonmarital pregnancies. The present research maintains that previous studies may have obscured important differences in exposure risk and hypothesizes that female pledge breakers who have higher exposure risk are more likely to experience human papillomavirus HPV and nonmarital pregnancies. To test this hypothesis, this study uses the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, logistic regression, and event history modeling. The results show that, after accounting for differences in exposure risk, pledge breakers have higher risk of HPV and nonmarital pregnancy.

Teenagers who take virginity pledges, in which they promise to refrain from sex until marriage, under certain conditions delay intercourse substantially longer than those who do not make such a public commitment to chastity, according to a newly released study. The study, which analyzed the answers of 6, students from schools to a range of questions, is the first to show that any of the activities associated with a growing movement to promote abstinence -- in this case, through voluntary virginity pledges -- has any effect on the sexual behavior of teenagers. Jimmy Hester, coordinator of True Love Waits, an abstinence group that grew out of the Southern Baptist Convention, hailed the report as ''great news. Hester said the group acted out of moral conviction, rather than any certainty that the promises were effective in steering teenagers away from sex. Hester said. Christine A.

Virginity pledges or abstinence pledges or purity pledges are commitments made by teenagers and young adults to refrain from sexual intercourse until marriage. The first virginity pledge program was True Love Waits , started in by the Southern Baptist Convention , which now claims over 2. Another prominent virginity pledge program was the Silver Ring Thing SRT which started in has been featured in hundreds of media reports worldwide.

Teen birth and pregnancy rates have been in a free fall, and there are a few commonly held explanations why. One is that more teens are using the morning-after pill and long-acting reversible contraceptives, or LARCs. The economy might have played a role, since the decline in teen births accelerated during the recession. As of , about one in eight teens, or 12 percent, pledged to be sexually abstinent until marriage. Some studies have found that taking virginity pledges does indeed lead teens to delay sex and have fewer overall sex partners.