A COMPARISON OF MALES AND FEMALE ADOLESCENTS IN RELATION TO SEXUAL ATTITUDES
The purpose of this study was to compare the sexual attitudes of male adolescents in contemporary Hong Kong with those of female adolescents in the Special Administrative District. One research question was investigated and four hypotheses were tested. The data required to test the hypotheses were collected from a sample of the population of the adolescent residents of Hong Kong. Adolescent was defined for the purposes of this study as ages 14 through 18.
The research question ["Do the sexual attitudes of adolescents in Hong Kong vary according to gender"] was answered affirmatively in a nominal context, as female adolescents among the research sample were uniformly more conservative and traditional on average in their attitudes toward sexual behavior than were the male adolescents. When the data were tested for the statistical significance of the response variations, however, the only statistically significant variation between female and male adolescents involved their perceptions of the risk of pregnancy arising from participation in unprotected sex. Thus, one conclusion that is drawn from the findings of the research performed for this study was that sexual attitudes among adolescents in Hong Kong do not vary according to gender to a statistically significant extent.
A second important finding of this research, however, was that, on average, both female and male adolescents in Hong Kong remain closer to traditional Chinese moral values in relation to sexual attitudes and behaviors than to the more liberal sexual attitudes and behaviors embraced by adolescents in the developed Western countries. This latter finding contradicts the hypothesis of a leveling of cultural values resulting from the spread of Western values to youth around the world through advanced communication technologies.
1 - INTRODUCTION .............................. ...