Reproductive and contraceptive knowledge, contraceptive self-efficacy, and contraceptive behavior among teenage women
Levinson, R.A.
Adolescence 30(117): 65-85
1995
ISSN/ISBN: 0001-8449 PMID: 7625265 Document Number: 392399
A study of the relationships among adolescent females' contraceptive self-efficacy, contraceptive usage, and reproductive and contraceptive knowledge produced findings relevant to the content of sex education programs. Participants included 258 family planning clinic clients from Sunnyvale, California, and 263 such clients from Chicago, Illinois; the average age of respondents was 17.6 years. About 20% of women in both samples were not using a contraceptive method. The mean contraceptive use score, on a scale from 1 (inefficacious contraception) to 4 (highly efficacious contraceptive use), was 2.3 for the California group and 2.6 for the Illinois women. The mean reproductive and contraceptive knowledge score, on a scale from 1 to 7, was 4.2 in the former and 3.1 in the latter sample. Multivariate regression analyses failed to reveal any significant interactions among postulated predictors of contraceptive behavior (knowledge, self-efficacy, education, age, pregnancy and abortion history). Contraceptive self-efficacy was significantly related to knowledge for the communication, physical acceptance, and prevention subscales but not for the control subscale. Overall, the four self-efficacy subscales explained 12% of the variance in contraceptive usage in the Illinois sample and 28% of the variance in the California sample. Of concern were the high percentages of adolescents in both samples who were misinformed about the time during the menstrual cycle when the risk of pregnancy is greatest, the relative reliability of the various contraceptive methods, and proper condom use techniques. It is speculated that method-specific measures of knowledge and use would be more likely than the single indicators used in this study to detect interrelationships between knowledge and behavior.