Adolescents' perceptions of maternal disapproval of sex: Relationship to sexual outcomes

Purpose: To examine the relationship between adolescents' perceptions of ma ternal abstinence attitudes, adolescent-maternal relationship satisfaction, and the occurrence in the ensuing 12 months of: (a) sexual intercourse, (b ) the use of birth control at intercourse, and (c) the occurrence of pregna ncy. We also examined the accuracy of adolescents in perceiving the attitud es of their mothers as well as factors that predicted underestimations of t hese attitudes. Finally, the study evaluated the relative predictive power of adolescent perceptions of maternal abstinence attitudes and the actual m aternal abstinence attitudes. Methods: This was a prospective study using a subsample of the Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health database, which is a nationally representative school-based sample. The sample for the present study was approximately 10, 000 adolescents in grades 7 to 11 who completed 2 interviews in their homes at a 1-year interval. Mothers of the adolescents were interviewed only dur ing Wave 1. Interviews covered a variety of topics, including adolescent ri sk behaviors and family relationships. Measures at Wave 1 were used to pred ict outcomes at Wave 5 employing logistic and multiple regression technique s. Results: Adolescents' perceptions of maternal attitudes toward the adolesce nts' engaging in sexual intercourse, and adolescent satisfaction with the m aternal relationship were predictive of the occurrence of sexual intercours e between Wave 1 and Wave 2, as well as the occurrence of pregnancy. The mo re disapproving adolescents perceived their mothers to be toward their enga ging in sexual intercourse and the more satisfied adolescents were with the ir relationship with their mothers, the less likely adolescents were to ini tiate sexual activity or to become pregnant. Only relationship satisfaction was predictive of the use of birth control, such that more satisfied adole scents were more likely td use birth control at their most recent intercour se. The correlation between adolescent perceptions of maternal abstinence a ttitudes and actual maternal attitudes was .26. Adolescent perceptions of m aternal attitudes tended to be a more consistent predictor of outcomes than actual maternal attitudes. Conclusions: The results are consistent with a growing body of literature t hat suggests the importance of adolescents' perceptions of maternal attitud es in determining sexual risk behaviors, Adolescents may misperceive the at titudes of parents, suggesting the need for communication between parent an d teen. (C) Society for Adolescent Medicine, 2000.