HETEROSEXUAL ROMANTIC RELATIONSHIPS AND SEXUAL BEHAVIORS OF YOUNG ADOLESCENT GIRLS

Purpose: To compare the heterosexual romantic relationships of a cohor t of sexually experienced and sexually inexperienced adolescent girls, to describe the perceptions of the appropriateness of the age of firs t intercourse, and to evaluate the reasons why sexually experienced gi rls chose to have sexual intercourse the first and the most recent tim es they had sexual intercourse. Methods: Girls (n = 174) with a mean a ge of 14.5 years were recruited from an urban-based adolescent clinic to participate in a longitudinal study of psychosexual development. Th e subjects were interviewed regarding their views about relationships and sexual behaviors. For the purposes of this study, data were analyz ed from the first wave of data collection. Results and Conclusions: Th e results of this study revealed that sexually experienced girls were more likely than sexually inexperienced ones to share unique informati on and spend time with their boyfriends, and to anticipate that their relationships would last longer. Regardless of sexual experience, 35% of their relationships were not mutually exclusive, which places the s exually experienced girls at risk for sexually transmitted infections. Most of the girls felt that they had been ''too young'' at the time o f first intercourse. The reasons the adolescent girls gave for having intercourse the first time and the most recent time were correlated. I t would be useful to incorporate the results of this study into subseq uent research which identifies strategies to aid girls to postpone the initiation of intercourse, and maintain exclusive sexual relationship s. Helping sexually experienced girls consider why they have had inter course in the past can aid future decision-making. (C) Society for Ado lescent Medicine, 1997.