Anita Barbee
Anita Barbee, professor at the Kent School of Social Work of the University of Louisville, will present a talk titled “The Role of Relationship Education in Teen Pregnancy Prevention Among High-Risk Youth” at 11 a.m. Wednesday, June 5, in Schroeder Hall, room 103. This event will be free and open to the public.
Barbee will outline how the public health approach to teen pregnancy prevention has largely been to simply focus on describing problems with risky sexual behavior, ways to mitigate risk, and teaching youth how to mitigate those risks. Yet, the rates for minority youth, LGBTQ youth, and youth in the foster care system have remained high.
A research team at the Kent School hypothesized that situating comprehensive sex education within the context of a larger curriculum on healthy relationships and dating violence prevention would be effective in bringing more meaning to the relationships of youth in these groups. The findings, execution, and the effects on these communities will be discussed.
This speaker series is sponsored by the College of Arts and Sciences Interdisciplinary Initiative and the ISU Interdisciplinary Research Group on Personal Relationships, with assistance from Illinois State University’s Department of Psychology, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, School of Communication, Department of Family and Consumer Sciences, and from the College of Applied Science and Technology.
For special accommodations or questions, please contact Susan Sprecher at sprecher@ilstu.edu. Please allow sufficient time to arrange the accommodation.
