Abstract

Internet-based platforms present vital new venues for sex education. However, research is limited on the ways adolescents utilize these resources, particularly within user-generated content contexts. This study assesses the sexual health content adolescents seek online through a qualitative, directed content analysis of 365 user-generated posts in an open sexual health community forum. An adapted version of the National Sex Education Standards, a comprehensive, evidence-based sexual health framework, was used as the schema for this data analysis. Collectively, our results highlight and confirm the importance of providing comprehensive, medically accurate sexual health information to adolescents. Our analysis further supports the need to provide information on pleasure in sexual health and well-being, as well as guidance on social and emotional aspects of sexual health, and for education to be supportive and inclusive of all individuals. Ultimately, our results can help guide effective public health interventions, including sex education efforts, aimed at promotion of adolescent sexual health by offering direct insight into adolescents’ perceived information needs.

摘要

基于互联网的平台为性教育提供了重要的新场所。然而，对青少年利用这些资源的方式的研究有限，特别是在用户生成的内容背景下。本研究通过对开放性健康社区论坛中 365 个用户生成的帖子进行定性、定向内容分析，评估青少年在线寻求的性健康内容。国家性教育标准的改编版本是一个全面的、基于证据的性健康框架，被用作该数据分析的模式。总的来说，我们的结果强调并证实了向青少年提供全面、医学上准确的性健康信息的重要性。我们的分析进一步支持需要提供有关性健康和福祉的愉悦信息，以及有关性健康的社会和情感方面的指导，以及支持和包容所有人的教育。最终，我们的结果可以帮助指导有效的公共卫生干预措施，包括性教育工作，旨在通过直接洞察青少年感知的信息需求来促进青少年性健康。