Silent Struggles: Evaluating Sexual Coercion Levels among Adolescents

Abstract

Sexual coercion in adolescents refers to situations where an individual compels or forces a young person into sexual behaviors without their consent. This coercion can manifest through verbal pressure, physical assault, substance abuse, or peer pressure. Acknowledging the need to measure and comprehend the extent of sexual coercion among teenagers, a dedicated scale was developed, providing a crucial tool to address this often overlooked issue. In the study, students from classes IX to XII in Chennai schools were randomly selected, and 252 correctly completed questionnaires were included for analysis. The findings robustly support the scale’s internal consistency and reliability in measuring sexual coercion, validated by a confidence interval demonstrating an adequate range for the true Cronbach Alpha score. The data, categorized into Low, Moderate, and High levels, reveals that 20.63% reported a Low level, 48.02% experienced a Moderate level, and 31.35% indicated a High level of sexual coercion. The study concludes that a valid and reliable tool for assessing adolescents’ sexual coercion has been successfully developed, suggesting a moderate prevalence of this issue among adolescents. To address the identified awareness gap, it emphasizes the crucial need for advocating a comprehensive and age-appropriate curriculum for sexuality education in schools.