Thursday, August 2, 2007

Abstinence Educator: News Reports Misrepresent Programs' Effectiveness

Posted at LifeNews.com.

A leading abstinence educator says news reports on the debate between abstinence and sexual education have misrepresented the effectiveness of programs telling kids about the benefits of waiting to have sex. She says the media has been too quick to rely on one-sided reports blasting abstinence.
Valerie Huber, the executive director of the National Abstinence Education Association, wrote a counterpoint op-ed appearing on Monday in USA Today.

The editorial, which opposes the views of the newspaper's editors, says abstinence has "been repeatedly misrepresented in the media."

Huber condemns the recent "narrow" report issued by Mathmatica as evidence that abstinence education doesn't work, but she says the report's own researchers cautioned about extrapolating any policy decisions from it.

"A principal researcher of the study states results shouldn't be used to draw sweeping conclusions, in part because the study evaluated only four of 700 abstinence programs," Huber explains. "The relatively new programs targeted young adolescents and provided no follow-up."

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