Via Clive Thompson here’s an ought-to-be-more-widely-known tidbit about abstinence-only education programs, specifically about abstinence-pledge programs.

Two key items – Celibacy pledges are effective only as long as celibacy is seen as a sign of non-conformity. Celibacy loses its appeal once it becomes a majority practice.

Speaking as a prudish libertine, I suppose overall it’s better for individual youngsters to consider themselves predominantly celibate with occasional slip-ups than to think of them as promiscuous with extended "dry" periods. Considering the track record of most school-age kids it’s probably also more realistic.

A celibacy bias makes them less likely to "stray" for totally trivial reasons (e.g. peer pressure, ennui, a sense that they’re not "getting enough.") A celibacy bias probably ought to make them better appreciate, and ideally enjoy, the occasions when they do have sex.

Or, to put it even more bluntly, if a youth is going to have sex I suspect it’s healthier that he or she regard it as something like literally "getting lucky" than for them to think something like "well it’s about time" or "finally, I’m no longer a loser."

But! There’s the matter of the second key item: – When celibacy-pledges break their pledges, they’re far less likely to use birth control or worry about communicable diseases.

I suspect there are three reasons for this:
1) Abstinence-only education may use threats of STDs and pregnancy as a deterrent, but if they do then by definition they can not also provide education for circumventing those deterrents. Thus kids who finally fumble each other off the pledge are likely to be particularly in the dark about the details.

2) Those that swallow the abstinence-only message but have sex anyway are more likely to have those uneasy "condoms make it a calculated act instead of true love" problems that traditionally lead to so many teen pregnancies and deep-seated untreated VD infections.

3) Those who have hopped on, and then fallen off, the abstinence bandwagon may adopt a "better sheep than lamb" attitude where if they’re going to "fuck up" by having sex in the first place then what does it matter if they really fuck up?

That’s all speculation though. Here’s the quote:

Taking the pledge greatly delayed whether a teenager actually had sex, to the extent that a non-pledging teenager was as likely to have sex with his/her first dating partner as a pledge-taking teenager who was on his/her fourth dating partner. The problem, the scientists discovered, is that the pledge only worked if the pledge-takers comprised a minority of the high school population. That’s because the pledge was regarded as a badge of nonconformist pride. Ironically, if too many people in the school actually take the pledge, it doesn’t work any more. Worse, when pledge-takers eventually did have sex, they were far less likely than non-pledge-takers to use birth control and to guard against STDs.

Link: Collision Detection

Link: In PDF format the paper on abstention rates and conformity in pledge-program schools.

Bottom line: I like the approach most sex education courses take — that abstinence is preferred until you’re ready, that you’re probably not ready as soon as you think you are, and in any case here’s what to do whenever you get there.

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