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Study: 83% Of Parents Say Its Important For Their Child To Save Sex Till Marriage

WASHINGTON, DC, May 8, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A Zogby poll released today shows that parents are far more likely to favour abstinence education over so-called 'comprehensive' sex education which focuses on proper use of contraceptives.  The poll found that 83% of parents think it is important for their child to wait until they are married to have sex.  And further that 78% of parents think sex education classes in public schools should place more emphasis on promoting abstinence than on condom and other contraceptive use.

The poll was commissioned by the National Abstinence Education Association (NAEA) and reveals that when parents become aware of what abstinence education vs. comprehensive sex education actually teaches, support for abstinence programs jumps from 40% to 60%, while support for comprehensive programs drops from 50% to 30%. This sharp increase in support of abstinence education is seen across all political and economic groups.

The results come as as federal and state lawmakers are debating funding for sex education in public schools.

On that question, the study showed that 59% of parents said more funding should go to abstinence education while 22% said more should go to comprehensive sex education.

"These results confirm broad-based support for abstinence education, including teaching teens about developing healthy relationships and increasing self worth and self control," said Valerie Huber, executive director of the NAEA. "While abstinence education has been continually misrepresented by its opponents, we were confident that parents would strongly prefer abstinence education over so-called 'comprehensive' sex education after they received full, accurate information about this common sense educational approach."

The survey also showed overwhelming parental support for how abstinence programs permit an age appropriate discussion of contraception within the context of promoting abstinence as the healthiest choice. In line with the abstinence education approach, most parents (93%) said they want their children to be taught the limitations of condoms in providing complete protection against specific STDs and to learn how often condoms fail in preventing pregnancy based upon typical use.

The majority of parents reject the so-called "comprehensive" sex education approach, which focuses on promoting and demonstrating contraceptive use. Sixty-six percent of parents think that the importance of the "wait to have sex" message ends up being lost when programs demonstrate and encourage the use of contraception.

See the Zogby poll results online here:
http://www.abstinenceassociation.org/docs/zogby_questionnaire_050207.pdf

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