Teen Sex Not Always Bad for Grades: Study

(AP)  There's good news for parents who worry that their teenagers' sex lives are affecting their school performance: A provocative new study has found that teens in committed relationships do no better or worse in school than those who don't have sex.

The same isn't true for teens who "hook up." Researchers found that those who have casual flings get lower grades and have more school-related problems compared with those who abstain.

The findings, presented Sunday at a meeting of the American Sociological Association in Atlanta, challenge to some extent assumptions that sexually active teens tend to do poorer in school.

It's not so much whether a teen has sex that determines academic success, the researchers say, but the type of sexual relationship they're engaged in. Teens in serious relationships may find social and emotional support in their sex partners, reducing their anxiety and stress levels in life and in school.

"This should give some comfort to parents who may be concerned that their teenage son or daughter is dating," said sociologist Peggy Giordano of Bowling Green State University, who had no role in the research. Teen sex is "not going to derail their educational trajectories," she said.

Last year, nearly half of high school students reported having sexual intercourse, and 14 percent have had four or more partners, according to a federal survey released this summer.

For the study, University of California, Davis sociologist Bill McCarthy and University of Minnesota sociologist Eric Grodsky analyzed surveys and school transcripts from the largest national follow-up study of teens that began during the 1994-95 academic year. The researchers said not much has changed in terms of when teens first have sex or attitudes toward teen sex in the past decade.

The duo examined how teens' sexual behaviors affected their learning and controlled for factors that might influence their results.

Among the findings:

• Teens in serious relationships did not differ from their abstinent counterparts in terms of their grade-point average, how attached they are to school or college expectations. They were also not more likely to have problems in school, be suspended or absent.

• Compared with virgins, teens who have casual sex had lower Grade Point Averages, cared less about school and experienced more problems in school. For example, female teens who have flings had GPAs that were 0.16 points lower than abstinent teens. Male teens who have casual sex had GPAs that were 0.30 points lower than those who do not have sex. Teens who hook up also were at greater risk of being suspended or expelled and had lower odds of expecting to go to college.

• Teens who have sex - whether it's a serious or casual relationship - were at higher risk of being truant and dropping out compared with teens who don't have sex. The researchers said the dropout results should be interpreted with caution because the numbers were small.

"Having sex outside of a romantic relationship may exacerbate the stress youths experience, contributing to problems in school," Grodsky said.

In a statement, the Family Research Council said the study confirms what the social conservative group has long advocated about the negative consequences of casual sex.

But the council said it "would not interpret less severe educational impacts on students involved in `committed' sexual relationships as a green light for comprehensive" sex education.

University of Southern California sociologist Julie Albright disagreed. She said it might be time to revamp sex education to "emphasize the importance of relationships and spell out the consequences of casual sex."

The study dispels the notion that all teen sex is bad, said Marie Harvey, professor of public health at Oregon State University.

"The type of relationship really matters. When it comes to sexual behavior, it takes two to tango," said Harvey, adding that safe sex should be practiced to prevent teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.

[guest173]

young people are better off to go to college and finish their Bachelors Degree before getting into a serious relationship. I dated young and the relationships got ugly and violent and the man didn't support me going to college at all, even ripping up my sociology book. I left him having to get police intervention. Finish school, then date. another trivia, more women graduate with Bachelors Degrees than men, women will be better off having higher standards for men then let them mooch off us while they are in and out of jail and barely working.

[commenter777]

Change is always a good thing, that's what you hear and thing's are changing. The morals are changing lower, and lower, and lower. When a man and wife have been together till their, say 55, and he wakes up and she's old and drooling, is she was loose when young he loses his motivation to be with her because he doesn't respect her. Tell your daughters that because men don't talk about it very often but it's a factor with most men. There are ones you practice on for fun, then there are ones with morals that you marry and it will always be that way in a man's mind. That's just the truth from an old man. Don't hate the messenger hate the message.

[webdepot]

Seems the difference in a committed relationship and casual sex is also an indicator of their maturity level... so the casuals are engaging in sex "because they can", a very immature attitude, while those in a relationship have or are in the process of learning about responsibility and commitment.

[rf35]

Good point.

[scottyusa]

What a waste of time and money. What have we gained from this? Who cares? Someone had to actually prove that sex does not make one dumb???

[voxpopulus]

Well, given the number of parents who claim it does ....

[Void-Master]

by surfergirl65 August 16, 2010 7:03 AM EDT

In the "old days" we were taught to abstain and use something called SELF CONTROL to stop the raging hormones until we were adult enough to understand the ramifications of our actions.

***

In the *really* old days, people got married at 14, 15, 16. And I really love the biblical account of the patriarch Jacob and his first "wedding night." He was so hot to trot, he never noticed that this father-in-law slipped him the wrong daughter till morning. Now... I'm pretty sure her veil would have come off with the rest of her clothing. So he never looked up until it was too late?

Yeah, let's all control our raging hormones.

[scottyusa]

No lights

[Void-Master]

Scotty, you've made my point :D He made NO effort to look at her, ummmm, face -- until morning.

[Myopinion046]

Sociology is a liberally dominated discipline, so I'm not surprised that they'd say this. However, simple logic would tell us that those who spend their time studying rather than messing around are bound to do better. You see, this is why I refuse to listen to liberal dominated disciplines without objectivity or neutrality like this. There not being enough conservatives within such disciplines to keep the liberals in check and balanced after all.

[rf35]

That's because conservatives tend to ignore scientific results that don't support their personal values and chalk everything they don't understand up to "god's will."

[queenofclubs]

When I was in high school in the 70s, I remember one of the class valedictorians was ready to pop her kid any moment. The controversy at that time was should she be allowed to give her speech. She did. She also had the baby. The couple married and both of 'em went on to college...with baby in tow. I say they're the exception, not the rule....and that teens should still be encouraged to put off sex and babies until they are older and ideally married.

[charles12346]

It may be great for grades but it sure is bad for abortion, broken hearts (run-away and irresponsible males leaving the females behind with all the responsibility) early families - creating home lifes with no home, education or job to pay for it, higher taxes because the rest of us have to put the teens and their children on permanent welfare, and more unwanted kids to have to suffer the Arageddon soon to occur because of this type of permissive immorality.

[ph0t0g]

Another example of people looking at a study and jumping to conclusions. There is nothing in there that proves teens having casual sex do worse in school, only that the two may be related. I would suggest that the same personality traits that cause some teens to do poorly in school also lead them to have casual sex. The only way to test this would be to ask some good students to have casual sex and see if their grades drop and have some poor students to stop having causual sex and see if their grades improve. Somehow, I don't see anyone trying to conduct that study.

[GunsInTheSky]

That is a valid point. Correlation doesn't prove causation.

It is like saying food causes people to kill others, just because every murderer ate food on the day they committed murder.

[smitvict]

So, evidence that committed relationships are healthy. Hear that Prop 8 supporters?