Social and cultural issues
Sexual behaviour is both a private and a public matter in the sense that it is socially mediated. There may be significant differences between social and cultural rules on the one hand and actual sexual behaviour on the other. For example, despite rules to the contrary in some societies, young people may be sexually active before marriage and men may have sex with men.
The same sexual act may have very different implications for those involved, depending on factors such as the age, gender, marital status, social status and cultural or religious affiliation of each partner. These contextual factors will significantly affect the extent to which the individuals concerned can make decisions and take action in terms of their sexual and reproductive health.
- Negotiating sexual and reproductive health: culture matters
- This article, published in the Bulletin of Medicus Mundi Schweiz, examines the new approach to sexual and reproductive health (SRH) being developed by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), whereby cultural issues are regarded as challenges and opportunities rather than obstacles to rights-based SRH programmes.
Recommended reading
- Sexual behaviour in context: a global perspective
- ( K. Wellings; M. Collumbien; E.| Slaymaker / The Lancet , 2006)
- This article is the second in a series of papers on Sexual and Reproductive Health published in the Lancet. It presents analyses of sexual behaviour data from 59 countries, describes current trends an...
- Reproductive health for displaced people: investing in the future
- ( Refugee Studies Centre, Oxford , 2004)
- Since the mid-1990s, reproductive health services for refugees and displaced people have greatly improved and expanded. This edition of the journal Forced Migration Review is devoted to the issues o...
- Violence against women, gender and health equity
- ( C. Garcia-Moreno / Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies , 1999)
- Recommended reading
- It is a fact that the perpetrators of violence against women and girls are most often men they know. Such violence takes place within the 'safe havens' of home and family. This working paper provides...
Latest Additions
- HIV and AIDS awareness in Pakistan
- ( London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine , 2009)
- Very low levels of HIV and AIDS awareness and condom use, together with high-risk sexual behaviours in vulnerable groups such as injecting drug-users and sex workers, make Pakistan a potenti...
Preventing gender based violence in Kenya
- ( J. Crichton;C. N. Musembi;A. Ngugi / Institute of Development Studies, Sussex, UK , 2008)
- Intimate-partner violence involves multiple violations of sexual and reproductive rights, with devastating impacts on the health and wellbeing of those affected. This paper from the Institute of Devel...
