Chinese Parents’ Perspectives on Adolescent Sexuality Education

Abstract

Structural equation modeling was used to examine a model of factors related to Chinese parents" level of involvement in sexuality education for adolescents. Greater parental education was indirectly related to parents" engagement in sexuality education through its relationship with more traditional cultural values, greater perceived knowledge of sexuality, and increased quality of the parent-child relationship. The model was found to be largely consistent regardless of the gender of the parent or child and the residence of the family. Results demonstrate that there are Downloaded by [75.142.198.187] Chinese Parents' Involvement in Sexuality Education for AdolescentsSexuality education is a lifelong process of acquiring information and forming attitudes, beliefs, and values regarding sexuality (SIECUS, n.d.). During adolescence, parents play an important role in helping their children to recognize what is appropriate behavior and to cultivate a set of moral values (Strouse & Fabes, 1985). Parents may influence their children"s sexual development through direct communication (Fox & Inazu, 1980;Holtzman & Rubinson, 1995), nonverbal behavior (Kim, 2009), and emotional qualities of the relationship (Jaccard, Dittus, & Gordon, 1996). When parents become involved in sexuality education for children, this involvement has the potential to postpone or forestall children"s sexual activity, and promote safer sexual practices (e.g., Dilorio, Bluhar, & Belcher, 2003; Fox & Inazu, 1980;Hutchinson, 2002).Traditionally, Chinese cultural norms have been conservative about the discussion of sex between generations (Bullough & Ruan, 1990) and parents seldom provide direct guidance to their children about sexuality (D. Liu, Ng, Zhou, & Haeberle, 1997). Since the 1980s, however, China has become increasingly open to the outside world, and more information about sexuality appears in the media. Although there are currently efforts underway to increase sexuality education in Chinese schools (Liu & Su, 2014), there are few studies which have examined the factors associated with Chinese parents" involvement in sexuality education. Identifying such factors can contribute to the efforts of Chinese educators to promote more effective sexuality education for adolescents. In this paper, we draw on theoretical frameworks such as ecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1989) and Gudykunst"s intercultural communication theory Downloaded by [75.142.198.187] (Gudykunst et al., 1996) which situate parent-adolescent communication in the context of culture. Our goal is to examine how parents" knowledge, comfort, and ultimate willingness to discuss sexuality education with adolescents is related to the interplay of the cultural beliefs of the parents and the quality of the parent-adolescent-relationship. Chinese Cultural Beliefs Regarding Sexuality EducationBronfenbrenner"s ecological systems theory emphasizes the ways in which individuals are affected by interactions with others and how these interactions are nested within an ecology ...

Look into the HIV Epidemic of Gay Community with a Socio-Cultural Perspective: A Qualitative Study in China, 2015-2016

“…Married gay men were more reluctant to disclose their sexual orientation to heterosexual partners for fear of divorce and subsequently broken family ties[49]. Chinese gay men experience immense pressure, discrimination, which may contribute to greater vulnerability for health issues including HIV[50–52]. Despite similar HIV risk trends among gay men worldwide, sociopolitical circumstances in the conservative Chinese cultures often relegates individuals into a space of secrecy and further risk.…”

The role of parents in providing sexuality education to their children

“…9 A study conducted in China recorded almost similar findings, where more than half (58.5%) correctly answered the questions on reproductive knowledge and most parents (65.3%) were knowledgeable regarding HIV/AIDS questions. 23 From the current study, most of the respondents showed sufficient knowledge, which indicated that they received good education from their teachers or other sources. Out of 20 questions asked, almost half of the participants answered wrongly only on two items: "The boys reach their puberty as early as the age of 15" and "Chlamydia is a sexually transmissible infection that only affects women."…”

A systematic review of parental attitude and preferences towards implementation of sexuality education

“…Thirteen articles from twenty-nine papers reviewed reported parents' perception towards their involvement and their experiences of providing SE at home. According to the analysis, most parents agreed the importance of SE for the well-being of adolescents and displayed high willingness to engage in their adolescents' SE, however, majority of them had not or rarely led discussions related to sexuality knowledge with their children [12,27,31,35,39]. They felt uncomfortable in communicating with their adolescents on matters regarding sexuality [12,32,33,40].…”

“…The barriers that hindered parents in discussing sexuality matters were being examined in this review also. The parents reported that lack of knowledge [27,32,34,35,39]; lack of communicative skills [12,31]; adolescent know enough/ had learned about sexuality in school [12,33]; not parental role to provide sexuality education/responsible of school [12,28]; children are too young to know about sexuality [28]; and lack of motivation to discuss sexuality with their children [12].…”