Baby Think It Over®: Using Role-Play to Prevent Teen Pregnancy

Adolescence, Fall, 2001 by Jennifer W. Out, Kathryn D. Lafreniere

The doll cried for several reasons. If the doll was placed in any position other than on its back, on its side, or seated upright, it cried. Unstoppable crying for about 30 seconds resulted if the doll was handled roughly. The doll also cried when it required care ("feeding" or "comforting"). Feeding demanded that the teen insert a magnetic probe into the doll's back, holding it in place for up to 35 minutes. The probe was attached to a tamper-proof hospital bracelet that was worn on the teen's wrist.

Rough handling caused a red light on the electronics box to blink; neglect caused a yellow light to blink. The microcomputer monitored the teen's responses to the baby doll by recording instances of rough handling and neglect, as well as total time crying.

Questionnaire. A questionnaire containing several measures was used to assess attitudes, behaviors, and knowledge related to contraception and fertility, and was administered during both the pretest and posttest sessions of the study. Attitudes toward teen pregnancy and contraception, as well as perceived susceptibility to an unplanned pregnancy, were assessed using the Health Belief Model Approach to Adolescents' Fertility Control (Eisen, Zellman, & McAlister, 1992). This measure is composed of 35 items, grouped to form 6 subscales: (a) susceptibility to pregnancy/venereal disease, (b) serious affective consequences of pregnancy, (c) serious resolution consequences of pregnancy, (d) benefits of effective birth control use, (e) interpersonal benefits of birth control use, and (f) barriers to birth control use. Attitudes toward abstinence and toward the use of contraception were assessed using a measure created by Saltz et al. (1994), Attitudes Concerning Abstinence from Premarital Sex and Toward the Use of Co ntraceptives. Sexual experience and use of contraceptives were assessed using the Sexual/Contraceptive Behaviors Questionnaire (Johnson & Green, 1993). A final measure was constructed to investigate attitudes and/or expectations regarding parenting. This measure consisted of a single item: "Try to imagine waking up tomorrow morning to find out that you have suddenly become a parent. Identify ways in which your life might be the same or different."

RESULTS

Approximately two-fifths (41.2%) of the sample reported being sexually active. Of those who reported being sexually active, 83% experienced first intercourse before the age of 16 years. Approximately one-fifth (19.1%) of those who were sexually active reported using contraception less than half the time.

Reliabilities were calculated for all scales and subscales. Cronbach's alpha was found to range between .60 and .82. Repeated-measures multivariate analyses of variance (MANOVA) were performed to determine if differences existed between the intervention and comparison groups on any of the dependent measures across both session 1 (pretest) and session 2 (posttest). The first MANOVA was performed on the six subscales assessing adolescents' fertility control. Significant effects were obtained for group, F(6, 107) = 3.76, p < .01, Hotelling's [T.suup.2] = .20; session, F(6, 107) = 2.60, p < .05, Hotelling's [T.sup.2] = .15; and group by session interaction, F(6, 107) = 3.55, p < .01, Hotelling's [T.sup.2] = .20. A post hoc repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) revealed that, at session 2, the intervention group scored significantly higher on the susceptibility subscale than did the comparison group, F(1, 112) = 17.88, p < .001. Adolescents in the intervention group (M = 12.47, SD = 1.67) rated themselves as being significantly more susceptible to an unplanned pregnancy compared with adolescents in the comparison group (M = 10.79, SD = 2.47). No significant differences were noted for the five other subscales.