Family and social structure Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Family and social structure - Essay Example cy that include but are not limited to; - Social economic status particularly the variations in income distributions across the society, levels of gender equality in the society, the availability of sex education in schools, ease of access of sexual health services that are targeted at teenagers as well as levels of exposure to explicit media material. In 2000, around 38,690 teenagers under 18 years old conceived. Around 45% of these teenagers opted for Legal abortion due to the fact that these were unplanned pregnancies. Several factors tend to influence their choice on whether or not they would want to be sexually active and to utilize the various contraception available to them. A majority of these decisions are done at a personal level (beliefs and attitudes, substance abuse, knowledge), intra-familial level (parent-child communication, family structure, social economic factors), extra-familial level (sexual health education in schools, health services, peer influences) as well as the community level (norms and values that are related to teenage pregnancies) Most of these factors can vary with time and depending on the available social institutions while at the same time others may not be that easy to change. In many cases, groups of physicians play the role of lobbying the government to enact policy initiatives that are aimed at controlling sexually risky behavior amongst teenagers that include improved sex education in learning institutions. The most significant role of physicians is to provide the needed sexual health information as well as services in their premises during the provision of clinical services to teenagers. These physicians have to be familiar with the realities teenage sexuality. Studies have shown that most teenagers may be sexually active by the time they complete their high school education. This means that physicians should try to include in their general inquiry questions about their past sexual activity, contraception use, STI