Sex, love, and religion in adolescent romantic couples'

1
Sex, love, and religion in adolescent romantic
couples.

• Catherine M. Grello
• University of Tennessee

2
Research on Adolescent Sexual Behaviors

• Relies primarily on individual self-report.
• Most adolescents transition to intercourse by the
  end of HS.
• Most transition within the context of a romance.

3
Religiosity and Adolescent Sexual Behavior

• Delayed transition.
• Less frequent sexual behaviors.
• Decrease in contraception use.

4
Love Styles

• Eros
• Passionate love, high on intimacy, intense.
• Ludus
• Game playing love, low intimacy, unreciprocated.
• Storge
• Friendship love, stable and compassionate.

• Mania
• Obsessive, jealous, emotional.
• Pragma
• Practical, shopping list approach,
  compatibility is important.
• Agape
• Altruistic, selfless love.

5
Purpose

• Examine the complex relationship among of couple
  members religiosity, approach/attitudes towards
  love, and the frequency of sexual behaviors in
  their romantic relationships.

6

• The data for this project comes from The Study of
  Tennessee Adolescent Romantic Relationships
  (STARR), funded by NICHD.

7
Sample

• 211 adolescent dating couples1
• 102 couples between 14-17 yrs old
• Mode females 15 males 16
• 109 couples between 17-21 yrs old
• Mode females 18 males 18
• Couples dating a minimum of 4 weeks
• (range 4 weeks 260 weeks mean 44 weeks)
• 1Couples recruited from a previous study of 2201
  high school students from 17 different high
  schools representing geographic (rural, urban,
  suburban) and economic diversity

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Measures

• Affectionate Sexual Behaviors
• Number of times in previous month couple hugged,
  kissed, and held hands (alpha .85).
• Genital Sexual Behaviors
• Number of times in previous month couple engaged
  in fondling without clothes, oral sex and
  intercourse (alpha .82).

9
Measures

• Religiosity
• attendance of religious services, importance of
  religion, involvement, and restriction of
  behavior by religion.
• Love Styles (Hendrick Hendrick, 1986)
• 36 items designed to measure attitudes towards
  love (alphas .56 to .85).

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Partner Differences in Religiosity
Age 14-17 t 3.579, p .000
Age 17-21 t 3.147, p .002
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Gender Differences in Love Styles

• Younger Couples (age 14-17).
• Males higher Eros and Agape.
• Females higher Pragma.
• Older Couples (age 17-21).
• Males higher Ludus, Mania, and Agape.
• Females higher Pragma.

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Model predicting affectionate behaviors of
younger adolescent couples. (Standardized
Solution N102) CMINDF 1.763, CFI .977
import
import
.500 .557 .816 .796
.745 .651 .768 .691
restrict
restrict
involv
involv
Her Religiosity
His Religiosity
attend
attend
.60
- .07
- .24
- .021
- . 182
Eros
Eros
.726 .644 - .192 .051 - .380 .351
.759 .733 - .388 .055 - .228 .438
His Love Style
Agape
Her Love Style
Agape
Ludus
Ludus
Pragma
.66
Pagma
.262
.223
Storge
Storge
Affectionate Sexual Behavior
Mania
Mania
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Model predicting affectionate behaviors of older
adolescent couples. (Standardized Solution
N109) CMINDF 1.763, CFI .977
import
import
.653 .791 .796 .731
.454 .570 .750 .801
restrict
restrict
involv
involv
Her Religiosity
His Religiosity
attend
attend
.70
- .18
.14
.066
- .111
Eros
Eros
.949 .535 - .329 .049 - .370 .183
.849 .534 - .356 .012 - .209 .405
His Love Style
Agape
Her Love Style
Agape
Ludus
Ludus
Pragma
Pagma
.61
.059
.534
Storge
Storge
Affectionate Sexual Behavior
Mania
Mania
14
Model predicting genital behaviors of younger
adolescent couples. (Standardized Solution
N102) CMINDF 1.759, CFI .976
import
import
.499 .556 .813 .799
.748 .654 .768 .685
restrict
restrict
involv
involv
Her Religiosity
His Religiosity
attend
attend
.60
- .08
.29
- .151
.083
Eros
Eros
.715 .647 - .170 .041 - .388 .366
.759 .740 - .356 .067 - .217 .436
His Love Style
Agape
Her Love Style
Agape
Ludus
Ludus
Pragma
.66
Pagma
- .199
.455
Storge
Storge
Genital Sexual Behavior
Mania
Mania
15
Model predicting genital behaviors of older
adolescent couples. (Standardized Solution
N109) CMINDF 1.759, CFI .976
import
import
.247 .643 .719 .743
.460 .573 .741 .807
restrict
restrict
involv
involv
Her Religiosity
His Religiosity
attend
attend
.70
- .18
.14
- .416
- .093
Eros
Eros
.904 .560 - .327 .050 - .376 .200
.874 .522 - .346 .003 - .205 .394
His Love Style
Agape
Her Love Style
Agape
Ludus
Ludus
Pragma
.63
Pagma
- .144
.375
Storge
Storge
Genital Sexual Behavior
Mania
Mania
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Conclusions

• Partners were similar in their religiosity and
  their love styles.
• For younger couples
• Females who are highly passionate and
  self-sacrificing engage in more frequent genital
  sexual behaviors with their romantic partners.
• For older couples
• Females who are highly passionate and
  self-sacrificing engage in more frequent
  affectionate and genital sexual behaviors with
  their romantic partners.
• Females religiosity was associated with
  decreased frequency of genital sexual behaviors
  in older adolescent couples.

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Conclusions

• Female religiosity decreased sexual behaviors.
• Female is the gatekeeper.
• Her love style was associated with increased
  sexual behaviors.
• Adolescent love is passionate and altruistic.