Paper Example on Adolescents Need Sexuality Education for Healthy Sexual Outcomes

Sexuality education is basically a fundamental component within a multifaceted approach towards addressing the great need for sexual along with reproductive health information as well as services amongst the adolescents. Globally, the rise in unhealthy sexual behaviours particularly amongst adolescent learners has recently become an area of more interest for research with aim of finding innovative approaches for promoting better and healthy sexual outcomes. It is clear that unprotected sex is the only main cause of HIV transmission globally as stated by Peskin (2015). Most of the youths initiate sexual activity at the age of 13 years which lengthens their period of exposure to STIs as well as unintended pregnancies. However, several comprehensive sex education mainly through sexual education program have been evidenced to be effective in reducing STIs in adolescents aged between 13 to 18 years.

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According to Espada et al. (2015), a comprehensive sex education which not only teaches about abstinence as being the best method to avoid STIs along with unintended pregnancies, but also teaches about contraception and condoms for reducing unintended pregnancy risk and of STIs infections, including HIV has been found to be a very effective intervention. Its interpersonal together with communication skills teachings have been found to effectively of great help to the young people exploring their own goals, options and values. For instance, according to studies done in Spain, interventions on sexual health along with sexual risk reduction in young people have been found to be very effective with regard to both short-term and long-term programs. The programs have been evident in increasing the knowledge of the adolescents about HIV as well as other STIs, enhancing their attitudes concerning HIV and the individuals living with it. The programs have also promoted positive attitudes concerning the use of condom, despite the barriers connected to its use. Also, evaluation from the comprehensive sex education program has been found to be helpful in increasing the adolescents knowledge in regard to the risk’s perception associated with self-efficacy, intentions towards engaging in safe-sex behaviours together with favourable attitudes concerning HIV. It has also been found to improve social skills related to negotiation of condom use and improvement in unprotected sex problem-solving skills.

As explained by Esapada et al. (2015), computer-based intervention programs have been found to be effective in changing school-based education on sexual health. This program showed that teenagers tend to learn less from teacher interactions or instructions as compared to computer-based instructions. For instance, the reviews conducted showed that the use of condoms had increased, the number of sexual partners had also reduced and a delay in sex initiation was also noticed. The online program was found to be more effective for the adolescents’ sex education as compared to the programs delivered by humans which is associated with fear, social norms and inadequate knowledge. It is clear that the findings indicate that that the most effective intervention would be letting more of the programs to be influenced by the social networks since the teenagers would be more open and free to engage in discussions related to sexual health.

The study by Haruna et al. (2018), claimed that, in this digital era, majority of the adolescents are exposed to an environment of various digital games. They play the games for fun and enjoyment. However, the reviews indicate that sexual health issues would be most effectively taught through game programs or game-based learning which is more motivating and easy. Game-based learning would be considered over traditional teaching since it provides opportunities for promotion of safer sexual behaviour via an environment of personalized learning. Games use for educating adolescents on sexual health matters is associated with a reinforcement of teens’ healthy decision-making as well as refraining from engagements involving risky or dangerous sexual behaviour. Additionally, acquisition of sexual health knowledge via games has also been associated with enhancement of cognitive development, promoting along with rising awareness as well as encouraging positive behavioural change. Game-based learning program has been indicated to be confidential by nature and thus it encourages the adolescents to freely engage in discussions about sexual health issues.

What are the emerging recommendations for future public health policy?

Rights-based curriculum has been effective in teaching knowledge about sexual health, attitudes concerning relationship rights, protection self-efficacy, health information access, partner communication and sexual health services’ awareness, reporting sexual issues and carrying a condom. However, for future public health policy, more sessions of booster education are recommended to run throughout adolescence since the young people initiate sexual relations (Rohrbach et al. 2015). By doing so, their knowledge on sexual health matters would be reinforced every time thus discouraging unhealthy sexual behaviors as they grow to adulthood.

Since it is clear that computer-based technology of teaching adolescents on sexual health matters impacts some sexual behaviour determinants, it is recommended that more efficacy evaluation together with full intervention exposure should be authorized. The programs recommended should mainly be pregnancy prevention, sexually transmitted infections and HIV computer-based ones as explained by Peskin (2015). The programs are associated with general sexual activity delay along with other unhealthy sexual behaviours.

A comprehensive program related to sexual matters has been indicated to demonstrate positive changes especially in HIV and STIs related knowledge with increased willingness of going for HIV testing in future. However, following these improvements, it is recommended that an implementation of targeted peer education in secondary schools should be done. It should be reached through appropriate allocation of resources which could involve time, money, materials and man power. This health policy can play an important role in preventing as well as controlling HIV/AIDS and STIs among the school youth (Menna et al. 2015).

The World Starts With Me (WSWM), is a program of comprehensive sex education in secondary schools which effects on some socio-cognitive determinants. It is recommended that The WSWM context implementation should be given additional systematic attention which could greatly improve its effectiveness (Rijsdik et al. 2011). Also, the program can be included in the school curriculum and should be made extra flexible in a manner that it places teachers in a better position of making logical adaptations in accordance to time constraints along with addressing particular problems as well as issues or concerns faced by the learners.

For effective future public health, parents together with other family members or guardians hold an essential role to deliver interventions like preparing both boys and girls as well constructing equitable gender norms as asserted by Garrido, Sufrinko, Max, & Cortes, (2018). It is a recommendation that they should fully play the role of assisting adolescent in accessing interventions being offered within the community, like human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine among others. The parents should be trained, engaged, convinced, supported and encouraged on how to prepare and be in a position of addressing the various sensitive matters surrounding reproduction, puberty and sexuality. This approach should be taken seriously because adolescents require various health, social services and education, and the adolescents specifically below 18 years in regard to the services is enshrined within the Convention on the Rights of a Child as added by Rohrbach et al. (2015). It should therefore be a recommendation for all the places, the service providers and the systems within which they function be geared to meet the requirements and fulfil the adolescents’ rights. In order to fully address this, empathy and competency should be built in social workers, health-care workers, teachers among others. Training as well as supporting the service providers along with reorienting the relevant systems are crucial towards delivering beyond numerous effective curative, preventive and promotive interventions that are available in the communities. Consequently, building in assessment as well as accountability systems is very important particularly with the meaningful inclusion of adolescents.

What are the emerging recommendations for future research?

The authors of the 8 articles recommend that future population-based researches and studies regarding STIs-related health behaviours should not be criticized by some interest groups and policymakers. This is because such surveys are very critical for assessing population trends within health behaviours, evaluating programs and evolving effective interventions, and thus once criticized, their general effectiveness is affected. They also recommended that there should be restrictions on garnering behavioural information specifically from adolescents since it is associated with seriously jeopardizing behavioural research as well as the capability of preventing high-risk behaviours amongst adolescents. The authors also recommended protection of the peer-review procedure for scientific research. Future research should also fully engage in analysing the recall sessions’ benefits in order to maintain the impact or effect of the programs on knowledge together with other motivational measures particularly after a year (Rohrbach et al. 2015).

Future research accompanied by rigorous designs, follow-up on long term basis, and standardized as well as validated measurement equipment are needed for maximizing results comparability. Also, future efforts must be directed to scale-up interventions which are evidence-based for improving adolescent reproductive and sexual health within low and also middle income nations, ensuring equitable results and sustaining the effects over time. Significantly, a number of adolescents globally are sexually active and thus it rises steadily from mid towards late adolescence and hence it should be handled effectively and efficiently for reliable results as explained by Garrido, Sufrinko, Max, & Cortes, (2018).

Moreover, they recommend for all the stakeholders to be involved within all the entire steps of any process and for an existence of a formal collaboration mechanisms among agencies and organizations. According to the authors, a neutral forum is required for maximizing the participants range and also for catalysing the collaborative process. Lastly, they recommend for enough funding in future researches in order to ensure a smooth process and a successful, efficient and reliable research outcomes.

Conclusion

Sexual health education holds a high potential for offering the knowledge as well as skills essential for adolescents to participate in making safe choices that are related to sex matters. This kind of education is very important in reducing misinformation. It increases critical thinking, effective communication along with self-confidence. Therefore, it is my personal opinion that more comprehensive education on sexual health and implementation of appropriate strategies should be highly recognized and evolved on a global view. The whole process should be taken very serious by the government, public sectors, private sectors, all leaders and all the other agencies and stakeholders involved since the knowledge obtained from such programs gre...