Reasons Why Adolescents Should Be Encouraged to Get Sex Education

I. Introduction

Thesis Statement: Adolescents should be encouraged to get sex education for three reasons: good for physical and mental health, good for sexual morality training, and good for sexual disease prevention.

II. Good for physical and mental health

When an adolescent enters adolescence, both physical and psychological changes occur. Adolescence is a transitional period from childhood to adulthood. During this period, adolescents become mature without the characteristics of a child. A great change has taken place in their bodies, appearances, behavioral patterns, self-awareness, emotional characteristics, and so on. The series of changes is accompanied by the awakening of sexual consciousness, which can cause adolescents to be curious about sex. According to Kar et al., there are three elements affect adolescents’ development of sexuality, which are biological factors, psychological factors, and social factors. In other words, physical and psychological changes as well as the surrounding environment play an important role for adolescents to develop their sexual recognition. Therefore, it is necessary for adolescents to get sex education in time so that adolescents can correctly treat and deal with these sexual physical, and psychological problems. On another hand, getting sex education is also good for adolescents’ physical and mental health. For example, it can promote adolescents’ normal physical and psychological development.

Normal physical and mental development

Adolescence is a turning point of physical and mental development. During this period, adolescents will face a great challenge that they never experienced before. Girls will get their first period and boys will get their first spermatorrhea. The sudden physical changes make early adolescents inadaptable, meanwhile, in the way of the mental, the changes will affect their emotions. They will become sensitive, shy, anxious, and fear. Many teenagers have little experience to deal with the sudden changes, so they feel stressed out. However, there are three elements influent teenagers’ sexual behavior, which are family factors, societal factors, and cultural factors. It means in the family, during the period of adolescence, parents need to pay more attention in their children. Parents have the responsibility to give correct guidance and educate them about the knowledge of sex. Parents should not only give their children care in daily life, but also give them spiritual encouragement to help them to adjust their attitudes and adapt to the series of physical changes during adolescence. In society, secondary schools should be required to have sex education classes. On one hand, teachers will give students more scientific and comprehensive teaching about knowledge of sex. On another hand, teachers will teach students some methods to maintain their physical health and hygiene. Helping students to develop good habits of adolescent’s physical hygiene as soon as possible. In the culture, adolescents should be directed to have a correct sex cultural view. Through sex education, to help adolescents to develop a correct sexual orientation and address gender identity issues. Getting sex education not only promote teenagers’ normal physical and mental health but also prevent teenagers form sexual mental disease.

Prevention of mental disease

Nowadays, we can see more and more teenagers have a mental illness. According to Brown, Larry K et al., “Previous research has suggested that sexual risk is elevated in those in mental health treatment”. Therefore, it is essential to focus on teenagers’ mental health consistently. So that, schools should be encouraged to set up a variety of channels for students to communicate with psychological teachers, such as a hotline, e-mail, network platform,s and so on, so that students can vent their emotions at any time and timely solve problems.

III. Good for sexual morality training

Adolescence is the critical period in which the values of the adolescent are formed. Therefore, giving sex education timely to teenagers can guide them to be a moral person by abiding the social morality of sex and sexual behavior. What’s more, it can effectively prevent the occurrence of puppy love, premarital sex, teenage pregnancy, and sexual crime.

Puppy love

When teenagers enter adolescence, there are huge psychological changes. This change leads to teenagers becoming interested in the opposite sex. They want to impress others by showing off. At the same time, they lack self-control, so some teenagers are deeply involved in love. Adolescent girls are emotionally and socially immature. If without proper guidance about sex, they are likely to do things they should not do at this age, such as premarital sex. The consequences of this behavior are very painful for young people.

Premarital sex

Teenagers are ignorant and ignorant about sex. they have sex on the spur of the moment is very dangerous. However, Adolescents’ characteristics and behavior are closely associated with their family factors. According to research, it shows young people from single parent family or the family which the relationship of parents is intense are easier to be interested to the opposite sex. This situation mainly happens to young girls. They lack love from their parents, so they desire to be loved. They attempt to make relationship with boys, and they are willing to have sex with boys in order to keep this relationship. It means that the family atmosphere plays an important role to their children's behavior development. A happy family will make their children feel more secure and make them know they are loved. Parents constantly pay attention in their children's sexual physical and mental development. They will teach their children that their bodies are precious, and they should be responsible to their bodies. Parents choose to play a role of a good friend instead of a ruler. When their children have some secrets in adolescence, their children are willing to share with their parents and ask them for help. Parents will provide correct guidance to their children; it can avoid them to do something without considering the consequence. On the contrary, a broken family will ignore children's sexual physical and mental development. It may cause their children do something wrong (have sex) because they receive little education about sex from their parents. However, early sexual activity can cause a girl to become pregnant, which can lead to consequences spiraling out of control.

Teenager pregnancy

Nowadays, teenage pregnancy is often reported on the internet, in newspapers, and on television. Teen pregnancy is moving toward a younger age. When a boy or girl is still a child, they take on the role of parents. Not only will they be looked at differently when they accidentally get pregnant because of their own ignorance and impulsive mistakes, but they will simply not be able to take on the responsibilities of parenthood. Most teenagers will choose to abort on the sly. This will affect the physical health of teenagers, but more seriously, it will leave deep scars on the minds. Due to teenagers' lack of sexual knowledge and lack of preventive measures, unintended pregnancy will not only bring great harm to the body but also cause teenagers psychological stress, anxiety, depression, mental anxiety, and a sense of guilt. Furthermore, it will cause adolescents have the feelings of guilt about work and school, and lead them to poor thinking, as well as can lead to lack of interest in learning and even dropping out of school. Finally, abortion may be chosen for unwanted pregnancy, which not only causes gynecological infection but also may lead to complications of infertility. What's worse, teenage pregnancy can leave a shadow on their mind, which can affect their choice of mates as adults and bring guilt into their lives.

IV. Good for sexual disease prevention

Most infectious diseases in adolescence are caused by a lack of attention to sexual physiology and mental health. Therefore, it is necessary to strengthen adolescent sexual health education, which is sexual morality and sexual responsibility. Furthermore, strengthening sex education to teenagers can prevent the disease in the first place, and greatly reduce the incident of sexual diseases and sexual disorders after marriage.

Sexually transmitted disease (HIV)

As we know, sexual intercourse is one of the most common ways to spread an infectious disease. Teenagers who have sex without any safety measures are at risk of contracting the virus. The most common virus that people contract is AIDS. Once infected, adolescents are more complicated than adults in terms of treatment and management. On the one hand, they receive psychological treatment, and on another hand, they receive lifelong physical treatment. To make matters worse, once teenagers are infected with AIDS, it not only brings a burden to the family but also has no guarantee on their future health, job, marriage, and children. However, everyone knows that AIDS is very harmful to people, but not all adolescents have a basic understanding of AIDS. Statistics show that only 36% of men in India have a comprehensive understanding of AIDS, while their female peers lag behind them, and only 20% have complete and accurate HIV information. A nationwide study of young people aged 15-24 found that urban adolescents have higher levels of HIV awareness than rural adolescents and that males are higher than females, and education has increased their awareness. However, although some adolescents know that HIV transmission is closely related to sexual contact, they still engage in risky sex because of the separation of knowledge, attitude, and behavior, and lack of awareness and attention to aids-related issues and knowledge of AIDS prevention. Therefore, prevention of disease and rejection of unsafe sex should be encouraged as an educational focus to guide students to avoid and reduce the risk of HIV infection.

Maternal and fetal complications

Having sex at an early age can lead to many negative consequences, such as the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies. However, adolescents' unwanted pregnancies may bring maternal and fetal complications. From a biological perspective, pregnancy during puberty can cause a series of high incidence of disease rates, such as hypertension, anemia, gestational diabetes, and complications of childbirth. It may also increase maternal and fetal mortality. Some studies have shown that the number of adolescents who have prenatal, postnatal, and postnatal complications is on the rise. According to Azevedo, “gestation during adolescence generates serious consequences for the two aspects of mother and child, to the as, lack of care and abandonment of the child. That the problems; School drop - out; Job loss or a decline in options of growing in the work market; And multiparity within a short period of time”. 

Conclusion

Therefore, Not only do adolescents need to understand sex from a physical perspective, they also need relationships that are closely related to care, care, and responsibility. By discussing sexual emotional components with them; telling them that sexual behavior involves responsibilities and consequences; talking about accidental pregnancy and how to protect herself. By giving them the right sex information to help them make a better decisions.

Work Cited

1. Azevedo, Walter Fernandes de et al. “Complications in Adolescent Pregnancy: Systematic Review of The Literature.” Einstein (Sao Paulo, Brazil), vol.13, no.4, 2015, pp. 618-626. doi:10.1590/S1679-45082015RW3127
2. Brown, Larry K et al. “Psychiatric Disorders and Sexual Risk Among Adolescents in Mental Health Treatment.” Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, vol. 78, no. 4, 2010, pp.590-597 doi: 10.1037/a0019632
3. [bookmark: _Hlk34943795]Carvalho, RC et al. “Fatores Preditivos de Hipertensao Gestacional em Adolescentes Primiparas: Analise do pre-natal, da MAPA e da microalbuminuria.” Arq Bras Cardiol, 2006, vol.84, no.4, 2006, pp.481-495.
4. Kar, Sujita Kumar et al. “Understanding Normal Development of Adolescent Sexuality: A bumpy ride.” Journal of Human Reproductive Sciences, vol. 8, no. 2, 2015, pp.70-74. doi:10.4103/0974-1208.158594
5. Naswa, Smriti, and Y S Marfatia. “Adolescent HIV/ AIDS: Issues and Challenges.” Indian Journal of Sexually Transmitted Diseases and AIDS, vol.31, no.1,2010, pp. 1-10. doi: 10.4103/0253-7184.68993.
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