Dissertation (MSc Nursing Education)
Parents need to be trained to appropriately communicate with adolescents about sexual and reproductive health which is critical in preventing them from risky sexual behaviors. The study determined the effectiveness of sexual and reproductive health training on improving parents knowledge, attitudes and communication with adolescents. This was a (community-based study) quasi-experimental study with control group that involved a pair of 128 parents and adolescents who were randomly selected. The experimental group experienced a pre-testing, received sexual health communication training for 4 weeks to impart knowledge, attitude, and communication skills, and experienced post-testing. The control group had the pre and post-testing but did not received any intervention. The effectiveness of the intervention was determined by examining the changes from baseline to end-line within and between groups using paired t-test and independent t-test. The effect size was calculated using Cohen’s d. Leaner regression was used to determine the influence of training in controlling other factors. Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) were used to compare the impact of receiving training. The baseline results showed that the mean knowledge, attitude, and communication score of the intervention group was 9.46, 13.76, and 3.25 while that of the control group was 10.44, 12.85, and 4.03 respectively. The paired t-test showed a significant increase in the mean knowledge, attitude, and communication score at post-test among the intervention group with a mean difference of 2.26 for knowledge, 7.70 for attitude, and 2.52 for communication (p < 0.05). The independent t-test showed a significantly higher mean score among the intervention compared to the control group for the knowledge score (12.71 vs 11.68 with the large effect size of 0.9), attitude score (21.46 vs 18.19 with the large effect size of 1.8), and communication score (5.79 vs 5.01 with the large effect size of 0.80). Sexual and Reproductive Health Training provide positive evidence that impacts parents’ knowledge, attitudes, and communications with an adolescent about sexuality. However, parents assisted and supported adolescents sexual communication process is imperative to lessening adolescent sexual health risk behavior.