Running Head: EARLY CONDOM USE PARENTTEEN CONVERSATION

Group #14
Quincey Jackson, Xiomara Orantes, Liliana Zermeno, Adriana Mancilla
Early Condom Use ParentTeen Conversation
University of California, Merced

EARLY CONDOM USE PARENTTEEN CONVERSATION

Introduction
Why do people have sex? Many people would say because we are in love; others
will answer that it was the heat of the moment, it was a mistake, it was a stress release.
There are many reasons why two people might want to have sex; the team did not want to
research why people have sex, but rather look into what drives the couple to wear a
condom during sex. And if they chose not to wear a condom, why not? The team decided
to test two variables when looking at why people wear condoms. The first variable was if
the person received the sex talk from their parents and how well that talk was. Along
when testing if they still talk to their parents about sex now and how open they are about
it. The second variable was whether if being in a relationship with the other person, made
a difference when wearing a condom. For example if a couple has been dating for a year
and half are they more or less likely to wearing a condom versus if the couple just meet
that night at a bar. In what situation are they more likely to wear a condom and why?
The team decided to create a survey asking the participant various questions about
sex. Everything from if the participant has had sex to when is he/she are more likely to
have sex and if they were to wear a condom. The team wanted to see if there was a
relationship between these two variables because, they want more couples to wear
condoms and have safer sex in order to stop the spread of sexually transmitted illness.
Literature Review
In the article, Variations in Young Men's and Women's Attitudes and Intentions to
Use Condoms With Different Types of Sexual Partners, by Brandon J. Hill, Erick Amick
and Stephanie Sanders, research was conducted on the sexual behaviors and attitudes of
young adults towards condoms and their intent to use them, based on the types of
partners, based on perceived risk. An online questionnaire was made to assess 594 young
men's and women's attitudes towards condoms, as well as behaviors with various sex
partners. According to the BCAS, young men were more likely to consider condoms as
an interruption to foreplay and sexual arousal (pg.456). However, women had a higher
intention to use condoms during intercourse (pg.457). Altogether, in terms of PVI,
(penile-vaginal intercourse) women had a better attitude and stronger intent to use
condoms in comparison to men. Young men reported condoms as interruptive to PVI (pg.
457). One of the main limitations is that there nearly twice as many women than men
recorded results. More men should have been used.
In the article, Patterns of Condom Use Among Adolescents: The Impact of
Mother-Adolescent Communication, by Kim Miller and Marin Levin, the authors studied
the timing of discussions between adolescents and mothers about safe sex. The results
showed that young adults and adolescents that discussed condoms with their mothers had
a higher association with greater condom use during sexual intercourse.According to the
text, "the study ultimately showed that early maternal discussions about condoms
promote condom use at first intercourse and that ultimately promotes condom use in the
future" (Levin, 1998).
Results
After conducting the survey the team found that there was a correlation when looking at
parent communication and condom use with relationship.
A split half reliability analysis found that the correlation between Parent
communication and Condom use is r (128) =.61 , p < .01. The Cronbachs alpha of the

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parent communication scale was .81 which showed that the scale did possess adequate
inter- item reliability. The average is 2.08(SD = .89)
A split half reliability analysis found that the correlation between Condom use and
Relationship is r (128) = .51, p < .01. The Cronbachs alpha of the condom use scale
was .75 which showed that the scale did possess adequate inter item reliability. The
average is 3.89(SD = .73)
Parent communication and condom use in relationship were related, r (128) = .08,
p = .36
Discussion
We hypothesize people that have safe sex and condom use conversations with
their parents at a young age are more inclined to wear condoms during intercourse in
various relationships. This survey study investigated whether or not parent
communication made a difference if their adolescents wore a condom while having sex. It
was obvious that parents communications with their children didnt make much of a
difference and showed that parent to child communication about condoms were positively
correlated as we had expected, but when it came to analyze if the college students were
more likely to wear a condom in their intimate relationship, that showed no correlation.
Out of the 129 college students that took this survey, only 2.33% of them had their father
talk to them about using a condom. In addition to that, only 6.2% of them had their
mother talk to them about using a condom while growing up. The data we got was a
good amount of subjects, but it is always better to have a higher number in order for the
data to really be applicable and a good representation of what we are testing.
This survey study also investigated whether or not condom use in relationships
were common or were they not as common as someone may assume. Our study results
automatically showed how the average condom use in relationships score was 3.85. The
data that we got out of the 129 college students didnt support our hypothesis because
there was no correlation between whether or not education taught by their parents at an
early age actually made a difference if their young adults wore a condom during sexual
intercourse.
Our findings had been related to the previous articles that we had taken a look at
and developed our survey questions based on those articles. The article that was the one
that we mostly used was the one that talked about the different patterns that exist with
condom use and mother- adolescent communications. The other article had to dealt with
condom use within different partners. We ended up analyzing that not all the research
data we received went along the results that we were expecting. We were all expecting
there to be some type of relationship between the two variables, but unfortunately there
wasn't.
There are always some limitations and problems with all studies. One of the main
limitation would be that 129 college students could not really give us enough data to
assume that all college students let alone the college students from UC Merced. Our
survey study had really good and straight to the point questions that people could have
easily related to and easily answered. There werent really any ethical issues that could
have invaded students rights. Perhaps they could be intimidated by the relationship they
have with their parents and maybe with the ones they have intimately.

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Our research variables could be further studied with perhaps fixing the survey
questions and maybe if people had different perspectives and different answers, then
there would have been a huge difference in the data results.
Conclusion
After conducting the survey, we came to the conclusion that parent
communication on safe sex and condom use did not have a relationship with one another
as we expected. Each variable itself were strong Parent communication is not common
amongst the student who participated in the survey (Figure 1). It was reported that
condom use in general is common (Figure2). We inferred the more the earlier the parent
has the conversation with their adolescent and the more often then continue to have those
conversations, it would mean the adolescent or emerging adult would be more likely to
use a condom when sexually active in any type of relationship. It is important to for us to
figure out what it is that convinces people, in this case adolescents and emerging adults,
to use a condom. We hope to see a better correlation between the variables by obtaining a
large sample from the UC Merced population for better and more favorable results.
References:
Miller, K. S., Levin, M. L., Whitaker, D. J., & Xu, X. (1998). Patterns of condom use
among adolescents: The impact of motheradolescent communication. American
Journal of Public Health, 88(10), 1542-1544. Retrieved from
http://search.proquest.com/docview/619371557?accountid=14515
Hill, B. J., Amick, E. E., & Sanders, S. A. (2012). Variations in young mens and
womens
attitudes and intentions to use condoms with different types of sexual partners.
JANAC: Journal of the Association of Nurses in AIDS Care, 23(5), 454-459.
doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jana.2011.09.007
Figures

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Figure (1): The bar graph depicting the distribution of the average scores for parent
communication.

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Figure (2): The bar graph depicting the distribution of the average scores for condom use
in relationships.