Kristi Redding Professor Holland Social Research Methods 3020 6 May 2013 What are we waiting for?

INTRODUCTION Quite honestly, when beginning to think about what I could possibly research the duration of the semester, a plethora of topics came to mind. Naturally, I began by thinking of the things in the social world that interest me the most. I also began to think of things that I can relate to my own life, understandings, and experiences. My first idea was to research how the way children are socialized to think of their gender and sexuality affects them and their thoughts on it later on in life. Since the topic chosen would need to spark, uphold and entertain my attention for the duration of the semester, I decided I would go with a topic personal to my own gender and sexuality. At some point in life, the majority of us are faced with the exploring of our sexual selves not only alone, but with an intimate or non-intimate partner. The research question that I decided to stick with however, will be why men and women wait to have their first sexual intercourse encounters? How and why do these situations arise and what are the factors that cause individuals to wait, to not wait, or to still be waiting. How do men and womens first sexual encounters differ? Reasons we wait are affected by what we have learned and are socialized to believe about our sexuality. This is different for men and women. I believe women wait for religious reasons, or until they find the right guy/woman. I believe men lose their virginity soon after puberty or due to sexual peer pressure.

My mind was opened up to just how differently males and females are socialized to receive and think about their sexuality. In todays society, instead of growing into your sexual identity and your sexual experiences naturally while being educated about it by well rounded non-biased influences. A heterosexual mentality is forced upon every individual making heterosexual sexual intercourse and heterosexual behaviors the norm. Throughout our media and world history we have established certain gender roles for men and women. This has me extremely fascinated with how we think and learn about sex, as well as how we are socialized to believe our first sexual encounters should happen juxtaposed with how they actually do happen for men and women of any gender or sexual identity. I would also like to think about why they happen under whatever circumstances. In todays society, we see that women are encouraged by older generations to either wait until marriage or to find someone who they are in a relationship with and comfortable enough to have sexual relations with for the first time. I notice that men are rewarded and encouraged when they have sex with not only one woman but many women. If anything, it enforces and holds in place their manhood while for women it diminishes her worth. How does this affect the way we lose our virginity? Doesnt this have some harmful effects to some specific communities? One example being, an occurrence of a positive spike in the number of sexual abuse problems we have in this country. The independent variables or indicator variables in this study would be how parents socialize their children to think about their sexuality and/or losing their virginity, as well as reasons to wait. The factors that may explain and shape the age of first sexual encounter include the following: religion, pledging, gender differences, gender roles and expectations, socialization, culture, educational level, socioeconomic status, economic status, social status, race and ethnicity, and where one may reside. The dependent variable would be date of first sex.

What happens when the child now turned adult must make the decision to wait or to not wait? In order to gather this information my first method will most likely be a survey utilizing the likert scale as well as another survey with questions and a choice between four answers created by me. I will be thinking of other methods of research to add on in order to gain more insight into my study. The key concepts would include social interaction with parents or caretakers, influence of religious institutions, the media, pressure from peers and sexual identity. Those are all factors that influence how long we as individuals decide to wait before engaging in our first sexual escapade. It is important for me to research this because it is important to recognize the effects of our societys way of socializing gender and sexuality and how these stipulations effect women and men in the sexual arena. I believe there will be some practical social benefit from my findings because these instances affect many areas in life such as the institutions of marriage and family seeing as sex, or unprotected sex more accurately can result in pregnancy thus the beginning of a family. Another way to look at it is from the pure science perspective, an example being maybe the difficulties those who may choose to wait and remain abstinent may face. Men and women both face these challenges in society differently. This study will help me dissect gender, sex, as well as double standard issues. The questions regarding why men and wait to have sex for the first time are important to my research because by exploring this, we can learn about what different people value about sex. From the findings, we can modify how we teach different kids about sex so that it may be more effective. We can also understand how socializing different genders to think of and value sex and the human body differently can hinder one gender and assign privilege to the other. It may be difficult for the individuals who are not undervalued to be able to understand the experiences of those who are. This may delve into the dating lives,

standards, and number of committed relationships one tends to associate themselves with, all due to certain experiences they have had regarding the gender differences in society and when it is even appropriate to even mention sex for the first time. I chose this topic because it fascinates me to no end just how separate the spheres are for men and women in our world. One of the purposes of my research is to document how people feel about the separate social sphere for men and women and just how it shapes and drives our first sexual encounters. I believe it is a beautiful thing to capture the way guardians are teaching their youth about their sexual bodies and exactly how that carries over into the world after social reality has hit. There are still a lot of details to sort out, but this is only the beginning of my social research journey. I hope you enjoy as much as I do! LITERATURE REVIEW Barrientos, Jaime. 2010. "Sexual Initiation for Heterosexual Individuals in Northern Chile." Sexuality Research & Social Policy7(1):37-44 (http://ezproxy.gsu.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/858943663?accou ntid=11226) 1. The research question guiding the research for this particular article examines the first sexual experiences of heterosexuals in Northern Chile as well as its characteristics. The author wanted to analyze sexual initiation from a psychological approach by interpreting the characteristics that surround these situations socially. 2. The type of data used by the researcher was data that came about from a close ended disaggregated questionnaire, recorded face to face interviews, and 13 self-reported questions. 3. Interviewees were chosen by simple random sampling derived after a stratified sample was taken. Questionnaires were administered using the 2003 Census to calculate the samples. 811

homes were visited and 526 questionnaires given out with a response rate of 64.8%. Participants were also brought in by using snowball sampling techniques and consent forms were used for all measures of the study. Non-probability sampling techniques were also utilized heavily in this research design. 4. The data was reviewed through quantitative as well as qualitative analysis. On the quantitative side, a cross-sectional study was done with a sample of people ages 18-69 divided in to cohorts by age. The qualitative side is where the researchers did 46 in-depth interviews of 23 heterosexual men and 23 heterosexual women. Interviewees had to be 18 years of age, residing in the city the research was being conducted at and able to give informed consent and could not have participated in the quantitative section of the study. The findings were put into thematic modules and made functional to one or all of the population subgroups. Participants also answered open-ended questions regarding sexuality and gender. This information characterizes and prioritized specific situations pertinent to an individuals first sexual partner experience, when, where and why it happened for example. Univariate and bivariate analysis were used to analyze the statistics and chi-square was used for bivariate analysis. 5. Sexual initiation occurs in the context of socio-cultural norms related to sexuality and gender relations. Findings show that the youth in Chile are now beginning to have their sexual initiations around the same age, instead of men being first and women coming later. Even though culturally in Chile, women are still expected to uphold the traditional values and save themselves sexually. Contrasted with what is observed in other countries, they are not having these experiences earlier, but rather more so around the time their male counterparts are having them. The author believes that in order to have effective policies to protect our youths sexual health we need to

focus on the socio-cultural and institutions that affect them and not base our programs off of individual gender related responsibilities. BOZON, M., & RAULT, W. (2012). From sexual debut to first union. Where do young people in France meet their first partners?. Population (16342941), 67(3), 377-410. 1. The main research question guiding the research in this study is where and how young people in France meet their life partners as well as the individuals they make their first sexual debuts with. Another question that is posed is, are their life partners and individuals they experience their sexual debuts with the same person in most cases or not. One of the hypotheses guiding the research is that people do not chose their life partners solely based off of chance. 2. The research design includes surveys done in France dating back to the 1950s to 2006, regarding the meeting places of couples who dated, the choice of spouses as well as how couples formed, and sexual behavior. They juxtapose surveys done in France for the past 50 years against more recent surveys done in 2005-2006 all the way to 2009 in order to see how two specific life events contrast with one another in respect to the social world. Special attention is given to first sexual partners and first life partners because researchers have found that on a large scale basis these individuals end up being two different individuals. Units of analysis here would be men and women in France. 3. The methods used in order to gather the sample the data came from would be non-probability. The type of non-probability sampling I would choose would be purposive sampling. The researchers manipulated and broke apart the information gathered to focus in on their actions during their youth to study the trends of Frances youth in these regards. They chose men and women who had at least one first life partner and one first sexual partner in order to explain how

Frances youth chose these individuals and where they are meeting these people they chose to have sexual encounters and courtships with. 4. The findings include both qualitative data as well as quantitative data. The qualitative data is primarily and largely describing the information discovered through compiling the data from the surveys over the years into quantitative data. The quantitative data included in the article is in the form of charts. The charts show what percentages of where people met their first sexual partners by the dates of their first sexual encounters and by sex. They also show the percentages of where people met their first sexual partners by the dates of their couple formation and by sex. This data is exemplified through bar graphs. The researchers also include a chart that gives the meeting place of the first sexual partner and first life partner separated by gender only and other charts include other characteristics that shape these experiences and sexual debuts for men and women as well in percentage form. Another bar graph includes one that shows how meeting places for first sexual encounters and first life partners vary by educational level and fathers education for men and women. The quantitative data concludes by giving trajectory charts regarding where individuals would meet based on gender and educational level as well as the social characteristics that are implicated when first sexual and life partners are accrued as well as the meeting places of those varied cases where the first sexual partners were also the first life partners. Their analysis appears to be multi-variate. 5. The findings conclude that the way we meet our life partners has changed drastically over the last 30 years and because of this we also need to include and think about the way we meet our first sexual partners. There were limited reports of meeting over the internet and researchers feel this may be due to the negative connotation our society attaches to internet dating therefore some respondents may not feel comfortable answering truthfully nor utilizing the internet as an avenue

for sexual encounters or dating. They found a heavy increase over the years of meeting in the place of study and they link this to the generality of higher learning and getting an education beyond regular schooling years. Nevertheless, the information found helped bring light to the dating strategies of young persons. They found that the research gathered in earlier studies and surveys suggested that life partners were more so found than sought out. Individuals meet each their life partners in their regular social settings because those are the people they find they have things in common with and may share cultural characteristics with. From the more recent surveys we see that this is the same for finding sexual partners but instead here, it is suggested that more strategies are deployed. The more educated individuals are found the meet in closed spaces and the less educated meet in more open spaces to the public. Strategies can vary based on social background and the persons sex. For example, women mainly find their sexual partners outside of the educational system which leads researchers to the conclusion that these women are about going outside and above their own peer groups. The contribution being made to the literature on this topic is how the way men and women meet their first sexual partners as well as their first life partners contributes to how gender relations are shaped and how gender differences are accepted in our social world and society as a whole. Women are socialized to be more aware while men can move more fluidly in these instances and be lead by things such as mere circumstance. Ferre, Zuleika, Mariana Gerstenbluth, M Rossi and Patricia Triunfo. 2011. "Sexual Initiation Decisions among Adolescent Women: The Uruguayan Case." Sexuality Research & Social Policy 8(2):103-111 http://ezproxy.gsu.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/864502945?account id=11226

1. This particular article dissects the sexual initiation decisions of women younger than the age of 24 in the country of Uruguay. The main research question is how these interactions coincide with their sexual health and how effective the information they are being given contrasts with that in regards to how effective it is and how it may or may not need to be reformed for the wellbeing of the female gender. The article pays great detail to the sexual initiations of these women with respect to three areas: sex and drugs, adolescent pregnancy, and sexual initiation and the use or non-use of contraceptives in risky behavior. Units of analysis include personal variables (education and religion) , socioeconomic variables(deprivation, marital status of the parents and mothers education). 2. In this particular article the researchers are relying on secondary data. The data used is from the Biological Social Reproduction of the Uruguayan Population Survey. It is from the perspective of gender and generation done in 2004 with the data being collected between September and December.

3. A multinomial logit is used for this design utilizing number 0,1,2,and 3 to indicate different situations for the women. A sample is selected from the GGS survey of the women that fit the criteria for the study.

4. Mean, standard deviation, minimum, maximum and mode are established for all of the variables. Chi-square as well as percentages is calculated from the sample taken from the survey. The findings are primarily qualitative and they are also multivariate.

5. The findings show that the probability that a woman has sex before the age of 20 is a little over 80% and the probability that she uses a contraceptive is about 70%. They find that the more educated women are about contraceptives the more likely they are to use them during their first sexual encounters. This is significant because it can heavily shape the state of women in their first sexual experiences and the decisions they make from there on into their adult lives. Information in articles like this can lead to the implementation of educational programs for women in these communities.

LaPlante, M. N., McCormick, N., & Brannigan, G. G. (1980). Living the Sexual Script: College Students' Views of Influence in Sexual Encounters. Journal Of Sex Research, 16(4), 338. 1. The hypotheses guiding the research are the following: 1. Students will stereotype initiating sex as a masculine action and refusing to have sex as a feminine activity. 2. Students would both personally use and experience dates as using more indirect ways to have sex and more direct ways in order to not have sex. 3. Internally oriented students would be more apt to report being the influencing agent and less likely to report being the influence within sexual encounters rather than the externally oriented student.

2. First students were asked to give their gender, marital status, age, extent of heterosexual erotic experience, and sexual preferences. Second students finished the 29-item Rotter (1966) Locus of Control Scale. Thirdly, students were given the Sexual Script Questionnaire.

3. Non-probability sampling was used for this study. Unmarried college students from a Northeastern state college were used from human sexuality, advanced psychology classes as well as introduction to psychology classes to partake in a study regarding dating attitudes. Seventy

one men and one hundred and sixteen women were involved in the study. Students were noted according to gender and locus control of orientation.

4. Findings were developed both quantitatively and qualitatively. There is plenty of narrative within the text analyzing the data, with quantitative analyses to exemplify or back up what the findings were so that one can view it in its numerical context. Tables included the averages for students sex stereotyping of strategies for have and avoiding sexual intercourse and they include the strategy type(rewards, coercion, logic, information, etc.), gender, and whether it was to have sex or avoid sex. Standard deviations were also calculated as well as significance.

5. Participants both accepted and practiced the sexual scripts that were hypothesized and found men to be more so the influencing agent. Those who do not accept the regulated sexual scripts are more likely to be less liked by those who do. From the research we can conclude that college men and adolescent boys are expected from our social and sexual scripts to be expected to be more sexually active while on a large scale women are less likely to initiate sexual behavior due to feeling uncomfortable in that sphere.

Uecker, Jeremy E. 2008. "Religion, Pledging, and the Premarital Sexual Behavior of Married Young Adults." Journal of Marriage and Family 70(3):728-744 (http://ezproxy.gsu.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/219770880?accountid =11226).

1. The theory guiding this research is that there is a relationship between religion and pledging when regarding an individuals premarital sexual behavior. For example, ones religion can have an overwhelming effect on the outcomes of the latter (premarital sexual behavior). Through social interaction we learn about these religious institutions that may or may not teach us the morals we use to direct our actions sexually.

2. The data for this study is taken from Waves 1 and 3 of the Add Health Study which is derived from a school-based panel study of health-related actions and the things that cause them with special attention paid to the social world. Religion is included in every wave heavily. Data was collected from the adolescents family, friends, partners, peers and school administrators. Wave 1 was done in 1994 and 1995 while Wave 3 was done in 2001 and 2002 and it hones in on relationship, marital status, education, and dates of important labor force happenings. The study is longitudinal. Religion and pledging are the predictor variables of analysis and other units of analysis include exposure, selection, social control, and context.

3. The data from the study is funded by the Institute of Child Health and Development and is the data from an earlier study that is being used. It consists of in-depth interviews conducted in the homes of the participants who were 20,745 American children Grades 7-12.

4. The data was analyzed quantitatively with the usage of percentages and coefficient charts from multinomial logit regression models. Their analysis is multivariate.

5. Of those who marry at a young age, religion and pledging both significantly affect sexual behavior beyond adolescence and up to marriage. It affects a number of controls and variables that may help to explain the trends. Findings include that the type of religion or denomination one is tied to matters in these regards to as far as how salient premarital sexual exposure is or is not. This is important because religion and abstinence are influential predictors of abstinence until marriage and they limit premarital sex to only a future spouse in many cases regarding Americans who may marry young. Vannier, Sarah A. 2012. Who Gives and Who Gets: Why, When, and with Whom Young People Engage in Oral Sex. April 1 2013. http://link.springer.com.ezproxy.gsu.edu/article/10.1007/s10964-012-9745-z/fulltext.html 1. This particular strives to assess how oral sex is incorporated into the sexual experiences of adolescents. We mainly focus on sexual intercourse, but this researcher feels as though oral sex is often included in the sexual encounters for adolescents but rarely studied or discussed separately from the sphere or sexual intercourse. Findings can help distinguish the sexual scripts established for men and women and gender differences that may come of that and be accepted by society. Through studying the sexual experiences researches focus on motives for engaging in oral sex.

2. Researchers advertised the study on social network, message boards, and university newsletters and asked potential participants to complete on anonymous online survey about their experiences with oral sex, intimacy and intercourse. In return they were entered in a drawing for a $50 gift card. This study done by the University of New Brunswick and its online survey was reviewed and approved by the board of ethics. Units of analysis include the following: ethnicity,

sexual orientation, relationship status, and whether or not they were employed, physical motives, goal attainment motives, as well as emotional and insecurity motives.

3. Of the 726 participants in the survey only 515 were included in the analyses because the day engaged in these activities a month prior to completing the survey. Participants who did not complete the survey in its entirety were excluded. . Researchers used a background questionnaire to find participants gender, religiosity, employment status, age, ethnicity, etc. They assessed all aspects of sexual history, last experience of oral sex and motives for oral sex.

4. The findings are quantitative. Although the Likert scale was utilized, data was comprised using standard deviations, significance values, averages, ratios and the Bonferroni adjustment was applied to some charts. Also, analyses seemed to be multivariate.

5. Findings include the following: Oral sex is a normative behavior for growing adolescents, oral sex is more common during sexual intercourse with a steady partner, women are more likely to give oral sex and men and more likely to receive it, physical and emotional motives were the main reasons for engaging in oral sex while insecurity and goal attainment were least common, and a cluster of gender differences surrounding motives for oral sex. Oral sex is a normal and healthy part of a young persons sexual history, but the motives for it can help ascertain how to go forth with the educational process in learning safety measurements for adolescents. METHODOLOGICAL PLAN For my overall methodology, I determined that I would not do an experimental study. Rather, I would follow in the ways of several of the sources I summarized in my annotated bibliography; recorded in-depth face to face interviews, survey questionnaires, background

questionnaires, and the Sexual Script Questionnaire. As far as my sampling procedure is concerned, I will be using non-probability sampling for my sampling procedure. The units of analysis here as I mentioned before are individuals. More specifically, I would like to reach onehundred men and women between the ages of 18-35 as far as possible participants. Types of nonprobability sampling for this study include convenience sampling, judgmental or purposive sampling, self-selection sampling and snowball sampling. I also plan to work and advertise with certain incentives in order to find volunteers who will willingly participate in this study. In order to find who can be included in my final analyses and who fits the criteria to go forth with the study, I will start with the background questionnaire which will give me insight to the basic demographics, age and if the participant has engaged in any sexual activity in their lifetime to date. This in turn will help me weed out who is and is not a potential participate and narrow my search to those individuals who I am aiming to study. I plan to conduct a cross-sectional study with a sample of people ages 18-35 divided in to cohorts by age. I will administer in-depth face to face in-depth interviews with an additional twenty-five men and twenty-five women; as well as administer survey questionnaires, and the Sexual Script Questionnaire to all respondents who agree to the study. The topic that I have chosen identifies as exploratory research. There is a social problem that I would like to identify and research. The ways in which men and women are socialized to think about their gender in their different social institutions I feel is shaping the way their first sexual encounters happen and it some cases, it can be harmful. Examples are unplanned pregnancies by our adolescent women. These can hinder the quality of life for some women and especially their children should they chose to keep the child. Patterns in gender differences or roles imposed on young men and women entering puberty can also have a problematic effect on

society. An example being how it is more accepted an many times even encouraged that men become sexual active at a younger age, while young girls are expected to wait until they have matured fully, found the right one, or even married. There is pressure for men to engage in these activities early and expected for women not to. Could this possibly contribute to the number of sexual abuse reports, molestations, and the raping of our women both younger and older? Investigating this topic the way I have methodologically, could possibly contribute to answering some of these questions about patterns and attitudes towards sex for men and women. The methods I have chosen will definitely provide insight to me as the researcher as far as understanding and proving or disproving my theories about what effects the circumstances surrounding our first sexual encounters. Another advantage of the methods that I have chosen to use is that they are easy to use, and cheap to conduct. They make it so that my target audience as far as respondents is exactly who I need for it to be so that I can access and retain the information needed to make the study possible and useful. An additional advantage is that my methods indicate that my samples are chosen for strong theoretical reasons. In carrying out the research design, this is the process that I will follow. I have identified that the group I would like to generalize are men and women ages 18-35. The background questionnaire that I have planned as a preliminary survey for potential respondents will ask general questions related to sex, age, gender, and if there have been any sexual encounters to date. From there, I will choose my sample from that population and administer to them survey questionnaires, the Sexual Script Survey as well as conduct in-depth field based interviews with fifty men and women total from the sample. I plan to gain access to these individuals through snowball sampling, and informant sampling. I will also utilize the individual students that may volunteer for the study from my collegiate institution since they fit the age and gender

qualifications and there is a good possibility they have already engaged in sexual activity so far in their lives. My particular research study entails a great deal of patience, logic and understanding of the variables and measures that will aid in turning the wheels to get the study rolling and off to a great start. I need to be extremely careful when examining the respondents so that I make sure I have a good representation of different races, ethnicities, religions, cultures and experiences. I plan to reach these individuals through different avenues such as social networks and message board advertisings with incentives and the proper authorizations from the university and the respondents involved. My annotated bibliography included all types of methodology. The following are the ones that I decided to take and use: non-probability sampling, recorded face to face interviews, questionnaires, cross-sectional studies, in-depth interviews, surveys, and the Sexual Script Survey. Other methods that were included in the sources I used for my bibliography include probability sampling, quantitative data analysis, secondary data, multinomial logit regress model designs, and panel studies. I believe that for the circumstances and information that was hoped to be received, proved or disproved, the empirical articles did a phenomenal job of choosing their methods. I chose to stick with a non random way of finding my sample because I want ensure that I am specifically working with the right individuals and I would also like to retain my respondents and not have a study so huge that people, expressions, experiences, and attitudes get muddled in the action of social research for my particular cause. ETHICS In this particular research design, I do not think there is much potential in the possible harming of the subjects involved. I say this largely due to the nature of the design. Respondents will be informed of the main purpose of the study and as the researcher I will be obtaining

informed consent from each participant. There will be no deception involved and I will be sure to maintain privacy and confidentiality as far as the specified nature of my findings and who they specifically pertain to. No experiments will be taking place with any of the respondents involved so there are not real risks here. Interview questions will be phrased as to not evoke any negative emotions and wording will cater to the sensitive nature of the topic being studied. STATEMENT OF LIMITATIONS Because my methods do not include a random selection, it can be challenging to determine whether or not findings are representative of the population. This is one clear limitation of the non-probability sampling methods that I have chosen. In order to rectify this, I may or may not need to alter my sample size to make it larger and more inclusive. A different limitation is oversampling and under-sampling which may produce an unwanted sample mix. Since, I am not comparing my sample to any other control group, I have no way of knowing of any outliers or opposing information to the details I am already made aware of by my specific group. It will be difficult to attain data on differences between participants and non-participants. CONCLUSION Throughout this semester, I have had quite a journey with my research topic. I feel strongly that research on topics such as this can be of great importance to the social research world. If we had more dialogue pertaining to the sex lives of todays youth, so many social issues like STIs, STDs, pregnancy, unwanted sex, and lack of sex education could be addressed and revised through evaluation research even. Also, we could learn so much more about the way the effects of gender roles and gender difference placed on females and males, helps or hinders the way they develop sexually as well as what kind of thoughts, practices, and habits they form later in life because of the way they were socialized to perform their sexuality. Research this

topic has been a true pleasure for me the duration of this semester and I hope it has been an equal or greater pleasure of yours sharing this experience and journey with me as my professor in social research methods.