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Although individuals in their early 20s experience a disproportionate burden of STDs and unintended childbearing, little research links risk behavior during adolescence to reproductive health outcomes later in life. The team conducted the current study to determine whether persons who engaged in risk behaviors during adolescence had increased risk of negative reproductive health outcomes in young adulthood.
The researchers analyzed data on 5,798 sexually active respondents from Waves 1-4 of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Logistic and multinomial logistic regressions were used to examine the links between risk behaviors (cumulatively and individually) and each of three outcomes.
Among the youths, four in 10 reported at least three risk factors during adolescence. The data showed that women who had an increasing number of risk exposures were more likely to have had multiple sex partners in the last year, rather than none (relative risk ratio, 1.3); an STD (odds ratio, 1.1); and an intended or unintended birth, as opposed to no birth (RRR, 1.1 for each).
“Inconsistent contraceptive use and having had multiple partners, a nonmonogamous partner or a nonromantic partner were associated with reporting multiple partners in the last year; inconsistent use, sexual debut after age 16, and not discussing contraception with a partner were associated with having any birth,” the authors found.
“Teenagers’ sexual behaviors have both short-term and long-term consequences, and interventions that focus on multiple domains of risk may be the most effective in helping to promote broad reproductive health among young adults,” the team concluded.
The Friends of AIDS Foundation is dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for HIV positive individuals and empowering people to make healthy choices to prevent the spread of the HIV virus. To learn more about The Friends of AIDS Foundation, please visit: http://www.friendsofaids.org.
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