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: Objective: To enumerate pregnancy outcomes for a representative sample of women in Australia surveyed in 2012?2013 (primary aim) and compare these with women surveyed in 2001?2002 (secondary aim). Methods: Computer?assisted telephone interviews with over 10,000 women aged 16?69 years (participation rate 68.4%). Results are weighted for chance of selection and to reflect the population as a whole. Results: Of women with experience of vaginal intercourse, 75.1% had ever been pregnant, 18.4% reported difficulties getting pregnant and 10.0% had had fertility treatment. Of those who had been pregnant, 91.3% had ever had a live birth, 34.3% a miscarriage, 22.8% an abortion and 2.3% a stillbirth; 0.9% had relinquished a child for adoption. The proportion first pregnant in their 30s was 11% among women aged 60?69 and 26% among those aged 40?49. Fewer older women reported difficulties getting pregnant. Of the 21,882 pregnancies reported, 70% led to live births and 10% were terminated. Compared with our 2001?2002 survey, fewer women reported ever having been pregnant. Giving up newborns for adoption has become very rare. Conclusions: Falling fertility since the 1960s reflects greater access to contraception and abortion and higher opportunity costs of childbearing. Implications for public health: These findings on women's lifetime reproductive experiences complement routine annual data collections., Over the last few decades several shifts have occurred in the pattern of births in Australia.[sup.1-4] The total fertility rate since 1976 has been lower than the level of 2.1 [...]

This article examines factors influencing English language education, participation and achievement among Karen refugee women in Australia. Data were drawn from ethnographic observations and interviews with 67 participants between 2009 and 2011, collected as part of a larger qualitative study exploring the well-being of Karen refugee women in Sydney. Participants unanimously described difficulty with English language proficiency and communication as the "number one" problem affecting their well-being. Gendered, cultural and socio-political factors act as barriers to education. We argue that greater sensitivity to refugees' backgrounds, culture and gender is necessary in education. Research is needed into the combined relationships between culture and gender across pre-displacement, displacement and resettlement and the impact of these factors on post-immigration educational opportunities. Training is needed to sensitise educators to the complex issues of refugee resettlement. The paper concludes with recommendations for service provision and policy.

Male prison rape and sexual assaults remains a serious and sensitive issue in many countries. Human rights groups claim that sexual assaults among male prisoners have reached pandemic proportions and need to be stopped. Researchers for many years have studied the causes of male sexual assault in prison and offered numerous recommendations on its prevention. Few, however, have presented evidence for a decline in male prisoner sexual assaults and investigated the reasons for the decline. This article provides evidence from population-based surveys of a steady decrease in male prisoner sexual assaults in New South Wales (NSW) between 1996 and 2009. The authors conducted in-depth interviews with former and current inmates, and using a "systems" approach they discuss the complexity of sexual assaults in prison, incorporating a multiplicity of perspectives. In particular, they bring together different sources of data and discuss this in relation to changes in power structures and control in a modern prison, the attitudes of older and younger prisoners, the concept of "duty of care," introduction of prison drug programs, and prisoner attitudes toward gender and sexuality. In anthropology, the term "system" is used widely for describing sociocultural phenomena of a given society in a holistic manner without reducing the complexity of a given community. (Contains 2 tables.)

Objective: To report on the prevalence and demographic variation in circumcision in Australia and examine sexual health outcomes in comparison with earlier research. Methods: A representative household sample of 4,290 Australian men aged 16-64 years completed a computer-assisted telephone interview including questions on circumcision status, demographic variables, reported lifetime experience of selected sexually transmissible infections (STIs), experience of sexual difficulties in the previous 12 months, masturbation, and sexual practices at last heterosexual encounter. Results: More than half the men (58%) were circumcised. Circumcision was less common (33%) among men under 30 and more common (66%) among those born in Australia. After adjustment for age and number of partners, circumcision was unrelated to STI history except for non-specific urethritis (higher among circumcised men, OR=2.11, p Conclusions: Circumcision appears to have minimal protective effects on sexual health in Australia. Key words: circumcision, male, Australia, sexually transmitted diseases, sexual behaviour, sexual dysfunctions, psychological sexual dysfunction. Aust NZ J Public Health. 2010; 34:160-4 doi: 10.1111/j.1753-6405.2010.00501.x

Objective: Many studies of sexual behaviour and condom use are based on data collected from university students. The aim of this paper is to determine whether first-year university students and their same-age peers have different patterns of sexual behaviour. Methods: Computer-assisted telephone interviews were completed by a representative sample of 19,307 Australian men and women aged 16-59 years (response rate 73.1%), 920 of whom were aged 17-19 years. Comparisons were made between reports of sexual risk behaviours from first-year university students and reports of the same behaviours from their same-age peers. Results: For female respondents, there were few differences in the sexual behaviour of first-year university students and their same-aged peers. For male respondents, there were some significant differences in the sexual behaviour of first-year university students and their same-aged peers and also different patterns of correlation between measures of sexual behaviour. Socio-demographic characteristics were related to whether 17-19 year-old respondents were first-year university students or engaged in other activities. Conclusions: The findings of studies of the sexual behaviour of university undergraduates should only be generalised to other groups with caution. The socio-demographic characteristics of the student population of a particular institution must be taken into account before generalisation to the broader population can safely be made from studies of single universities.