INFLUENCE OF SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC FACTORS ON AGE AT FIRST INTERCOURSE

What these data also illustrate is that just as the burden of adolescent pregnancies and STIs is not Tiffany Notes I Love You bangle equally across the young adult population, so the profile of adolescent sexual behaviour is not the same across that population. Social disadvantage (as measured in household income and school and labour force participation) and immigration status all contribute to differential profiles of sexual behaviour. Overall, social disadvantage (as indicated by lower household income and earlier labour force participation) is associated with more permissive sexual behaviours, as represented in earlier age of first intercourse and a larger proportion reporting more than one sexual partner in the past year. These results parallel other research where earlier sexual initiation and larger numbers of sexual partners have been found to be associated with lower family socioeconomic status (Theriault & Tremblay, 1995). Canadian research by Galambos and Tilton-Weaver (1998) using the 1994 NPHS also demonstrated a significant impact of social disadvantage in the form of household income and labour force participation on youthful risk-taking in general, with sexual behaviour included as one behaviour in their risk-taking measure. Regional studies in Nova Scotia (Langille, et al., 1994; Naugler, Langille & Beazley, 1995), British Columbia (McCreary Centre Society, 1993, 1999) and Ontario (Thomas, et al., 1998) report the same patterns for specific Canadian regions. However, when pregnancies and STIs are considered, what must also be recognized is that adolescents from households in the lowest income quintiles were most likely to report condom use at last intercourse, i.e., they appear to be better at self protection, at least against STIs. While low income youth may be initiating sex earlier and Elsa Peretti Open Heart bracelet with more partners, they appear to be more likely to self-protect through condom use. However, data on income and STIs demonstrates that this protection is inadequate.

The data on adolescent participation in the labour force and sexual behaviour also suggest that participation in the labour force may be a “marker” of entry into adult social status, i.e., it is a time when “sex is both an entitlement and an obligation of maturity” (Udry, 1988, p. 710). This interpretation is supported by the consistency of the relationship between presence in the labour force and both median age of first intercourse and number of sexual partners across the 15-19 and 20-24 age groups. While remaining in school into the third decade of life may well be an indicator of social privilege, continued education also has been shown to have the effect of postponing full entry into adult status. The strong association between labour force participation (or prolonged education) and sexual activity, coupled with other research on prolonged education and entry into adult status, suggest that entry into the labour force may be replacing marriage as the social marker that signals readiness for adult sexual activity (i.e., sexual intercourse). However, the negative relationship between labour force participation and condom use, with adolescents in school more likely to use condoms than those in the labour force, is a disturbing finding in the context of this Tiffany 1837 Lock bracelet of labour force participation.

ETHNOCULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN AGE AT FIRST INTERCOURSE AND IN OTHER ASPECTS OF ADOLESCENT SEXUAL HEALTH

There is little research on how sexual practices and sexual self-protection may differ across Canada’s ethnocultural groups (for two Canadian studies see: Maticka-Tyndale & Levy, 1992; Maticka-Tyndale, et al., 1996). This is quite remarkable when we consider how immigration is changing the composition of the Canadian population (Mata & Valentine, 1999). The NPHS only provides data for a preliminary and partial comparison across ethnic backgrounds. In this paper the only comparison that was drawn was between Canadian-born and immigrant Canadians, the latter group aggregating a diversity of cultures with the two groups compared only for age of first intercourse and the consequent number of sexually active 15- to 19year-olds. Despite the inadequacy of immigration status as a representation of cultural diversity, when immigrant youth were compared to Canadian-born youth, the difference in age of sexual initiation and the consequent number of sexually active teenagers is striking. Immigrants to Canada clearly presented a more conservative profile of sexual activity than did those who were Canadian-born. Later age of intercourse initiation may reflect origins in cultures that approach sexual activity from a more conservative stance. Alternatively, or additionally, the differences between Canadian-born and immigrant youth may reflect something about the experience of Tiffany 1837 Charm bracelet on the one hand, and the immigrant selection process on the other. Perhaps immigrant youth are drawn more closely to their families as part of the immigration experience and in response to the “strangeness” of their new land and culture. Closeness to parents has been repeatedly shown to relate to later age of sexual initiation (Daugherty & Burger, 1984; Herold, 1984). We must, however, use caution in interpreting the immigrant/Canadian-born comparisons, recognizing that the diversity of cultures and immigration experiences represented within the immigrant sub-sample has not been taken into account in these analyses.