1st Student's Major
Psychology
1st Student's College
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Students' Professional Biography
My name is Jannine Ray and I attend Minnesota State University, Mankato. I graduated on May 10, 2014 and will begin coursework in the School Psychology Doctoral program in the fall. I was in born in Washington but grew up in Woodbury, Minnesota. I completed the undergraduate psychology program in three years, which were infused with research experience on Dr. Eric Sprankle’s sexual health research team. I plan on continuing research throughout my professional career. I hold an interest in studying self-development in order to advance skills and abilities, as well as in human resource aspects of psychology. Additionally, my interests lie within areas of exploring the relationships that may or may not exist between specific behaviors and different components of psychology. Shelby Afflerbach is a recent graduate of the Clinical Psychology Master's degree program at Minnesota State University, Mankato. She will continue her education as a doctorate student at Oklahoma State University. Her research interests include topics in the areas of sexual health, forensic psychology, and neuropsychology.
Mentor's Name
Eric Sprankle
Mentor's Email Address
eric.sprankle@mnsu.edu
Mentor's Department
Psychology
Mentor's College
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Abstract
The long-standing social stigma surrounding masturbation has led to its prohibition from being included in public school curriculum as a healthy sexual practice. Furthermore, not only is masturbation a healthy sexual practice for the individual, research has demonstrated masturbation to be helpful in treating sexual dysfunctions for couples. Therefore, if the topic of masturbation is included in comprehensive sexual education as a healthy sexual practice, it may promote sexual health among individuals both intra- and interpersonally. The present study recruited from a convenient sample from a medium sized state university in the upper Midwest. Participants completed two surveys, administered through an online data collection platform. The first survey, Attitudes Towards Masturbation, is an established measure with sound reliability and validity, which assessed the participants’ comfort and beliefs about masturbation. The second survey was created specifically for this study and assessed the type of sexual education (comprehensive versus abstinence) received at home and in formal school settings. It was predicted that participants who received positive masturbation education (at home or at school) will have more positive attitudes toward masturbation than participants who received negative or no masturbation education. The results of the study indicate that positive messages learned are not correlated with positive attitudes. However, negative messages are associated with negative attitudes towards masturbation.
Recommended Citation
Ray, Jannine and Afflerbach, Shelby
(2014)
"Sexual Education and Attitudes toward Masturbation,"
Journal of Undergraduate Research at Minnesota State University, Mankato: Vol. 14, Article 8.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.56816/2378-6949.1052
Available at:
https://cornerstone.lib.mnsu.edu/jur/vol14/iss1/8
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
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