DISSEMINATION OF SEXUAL AND REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH KNOWLEDGE FROM PARENTS TO ADOLESCENT CHILDREN.

Sexual and Reproductive Health is an internationally recognized thematic topic in which concern has mainly focused on developing countries and on the knowledge dissemination to adolescent children. This study analyses the extent to which mothers can be utilized as a source of providing information for adolescent children on the subject of Sexual and Reproductive Health. In this study the sample was been selected from the Akkara 50 Grama Niladari Division of the Katana Divisional Secretariat in the Gampaha district, which was reported to have 1280 adolescents. There is a total of 2103 households in the area and 10 per cent were selected for the sample, giving a sample of 210 households. The data was collected from 210 mothers who had at least one adolescent child. A sub sample of 20 adolescents was also selected for cross examination. The findings of the study are discussed under six sub topics namely, demographic and socio-economic background, discussion of SRH with adolescent children, the perspective of mothers in disseminating SRH knowledge to adolescent children, factors that influence the dissemination of SRH knowledge, the perspective of adolescent children in obtaining SRH knowledge and challenges in the dissemination of SRH knowledge. The results indicate that there is a difference between the dissemination of knowledge to adolescent girls and boys and the age span of dissemination is spread throughout the adolescent years for girls while it remains for early years of adolescence for boys. The findings of this study also indicates that mothers have become hesitant about the dissemination due to social and cultural issues and due to their lack of confidence in identifying a suitable approach. In such a scenario this study has identified the mothers as a source to improve the dissemination of sexual and reproductive health knowledge to adolescents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]