The Effects of an Empowerment Program on Self-care Knowledge and their Attitude towards Teenage Pregnancy Prevention

Abstract

Thai adolescents had a higher pregnancy rate, up from 10 percent in 2001 to 40 percent in 2009, as teenagers began to have sexual relationship at younger age than before. This quasi pre-post and two-group experimental research was aimed to compare the knowledge and attitude of self-care and prevention for teenage pregnancy between the treatment group receiving an empowerment program and the control group receiving normal health education. In the research intervention, Samples were 60 students: 30 in the treatment and 30 in the control groups. The treatment group received an empowerment program containing 8 sessions lasting 15 hours to promote safe sex and prevent teenage pregnancy, whereas the control group received normal health education regarding safe sex and preventing teenage pregnancy. The researcher-developed instruments included a teenage self-care knowledge questionnaire (KR-21 =0.89) and an attitude towards teenage pregnancy prevention questionnaire (Cronbach’s alpha coefficient = 0.78), when used in 30 teenagers in Suratthani.  Their content validity, measured with internal consistencies, ranged between 0.60-1.00.  Data was analyzed for frequency, percentage, standard deviations; one- way repeated measures ANOVA, paired t-test, and independent t-test.

The research revealed the following findings.  Self-care knowledge of the experimental group receiving the empowerment program was not different between pre and post program intervention (mean difference = 1.4; SD=0.43; t=0.59). This result may come from young people having knowledge about sex education from normal health education classes routinely taught in their school. However, when comparing the attitude scores towards prevention of adolescent pregnancy among before, after the program intervention, and after 30 days of the program, it was found that there was significant differences in  scores (F = 196.54; p <0.1). When compared the different scores of the pairs at after the program intervention and at after a 30-day of the intervention, it was found that there was significantly different of the scores (t = 15.85 and = 18.24, p <0.05, respectively). .

The results showed that the empowerment program had no effect on self-care knowledge, but on the attitude to prevent teen pregnancy. The program can enhance a positive attitude to prevent pregnancy in teenagers. Even though teens may get the routine knowledge in the classroom, empower them in self-care is also important to motivate them to bring their knowledge into action.