Adolescent coital behavior by demographic characteristics: An exploratory study in Ecuador

Abstract

The adolescent's coital behavior is constituted by vaginal, oral and anal intercourse. However, in the literature, the last two are poorly addressed or, in certain cases, unknown, especially in the study of adolescent sexual behavior. For this reason, the objective of this study was to explore the different types of coital behavior in adolescents and to visualize possible differences according to socio-demographic factors: sex, age, religious belief, parental migration. The research was carried out in Cuenca, with a sample of 2051 school-aged adolescents (15 to 19 years old). The sample was randomly established. The instrument used was the self-administered questionnaire "Human Sexuality Questionnaire" (Zuckerman, 1998). The results show that 61% of the participants reported not having had any type of intercourse. Among those who have had intercourse, vaginal intercourse was the most frequent type (36%), followed by oral intercourse (25%) and anal intercourse (19%). The frequency of intercourse was greater in men than in women; but it increased in both groups according to age. In women, vaginal intercourse was lower among those who practiced some religious belief. The present re-search evidences that adolescents who express having had coital relationships, indicate to have been involved in the different types of intercourse: oral, anal and vaginal; and its visualization provides guidelines to understand it as part of the adolescent's sexual development and to include these as necessary elements in the generation of sex education programs based on their context.