Knowledge and Attitude to Sexually Transmitted Infections and Premarital Sexual Behaviour of Adolescents with Hearing Impairment in Selected Secondary Schools in Ibadan

Adolescents in Nigeria are contributing to unfavorable indices of sexual andreproductive health ranging from sexually transmitted infections, unwantedpregnancies, and unsafe abortions to maternal mortality. Neglect of thispopulation has major implications for the future as the sexual andreproductive behaviour imbibed during adolescence has a way of impactingupon adult life. This study, therefore, focused on knowledge and attitude tosexually transmitted infections and premarital sexual behaviour ofadolescents with hearing impairment in selected secondary schools in Ibadan.Descriptive survey research design was adopted for this study. Sixtyrespondents were selected from public secondary schools using purposivesampling technique. The main instrument used in gathering data was aself-developed questionnaire on knowledge and attitude to sexuallytransmitted infections and premarital sexual behaviour of adolescents withhearing impairment. Three hypotheses were tested and one research question was answered. The reliability coefficient of r = .82 was obtainedusing Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient. Ten trained researchassistants were used during data collection. Data were analyzed usingfrequency counts and percentages for the demographic part of the instrumentand the research questions, while t-test was used to test the hypothesesformulated for the study. The result showed significant difference (Crit-t =1.96, Cal.t =2.387, df=58, P < .05) on attitude to sex between male andfemale adolescents with hearing impairment, while in the other twohypotheses centering on knowledge of sexually transmitted infections andpremarital sexual behaviour as it has to do with male and female adolescentswith hearing impairment no significant difference was found. On the preferredsource of sex information, the result showed that 25 out of the 60respondents representing 41.7% picked “Friends” as the preferred source.In conclusion, it was found that there is a significant difference in the attitudeto sex between male and female adolescents with hearing impairment inselected secondary schools in Ibadan, while no significant difference wasfound between male and female adolescents with hearing impairment inrelation to knowledge of sexually transmitted infections and premarital sexualbehaviour. Therefore, it was recommended that hearing impaired adolescentsshould be assisted to have access to correct and adequate SRH informationthrough the efforts of specialist teachers and counselors.