Exploring Parental Perspectives on Parent-Child Sexual Communication Grant uri icon

abstract

  • The project goal to examine parental perspectives about parent-child sexual communication through focus groups conducted with parents of young children. The specific activity of this proposal is to conduct focus groups with parents of young children (i.e., birth - age 6) in Eastern North Carolina. Objectives of the focus groups will be to determine (a) parents' comfort level of discussing sexuality with their children; (b) barriers to parent-child sexual communication; (c) concerns about parent-child sexual communication; and (d) desired information regarding parent-child sexual communication. Data gathered from these focus groups will serve as a needs assessment for a larger program planning project. This information will assist with the development of a "parents as primary sexuality educator" program designed to increase effective parent-child communication about sexuality. Five focus groups will be conducted with approximately 6-8 parents in each group. The first focus group will be conducted with the parent group of East Carolina University's child development laboratory (CDL). In addition to the above topics, advice on conducting the remaining focus groups will be sought from the parents, including recruitment, questions to ask, approach techniques, etc. Because parents of young children (i.e., Birth - age 6) will be the target of the developed program, this will be the target audience for these focus groups. Snowball and convenience sampling will be used to recruit participants including university students and faculty, area parent groups, and child care centers. Both fathers and mothers will be encouraged to attend all groups. After the initial pilot group with the CDL parents, four additional focus groups will be planned; however, if we have not reached the point of saturation, we will continue focus groups until we stop hearing new information from the participants.

date/time interval

  • March 2006 - December 2006