Neighborhood Context, School Context, and Romantic Relationships

描述（由申请人提供）：拟议研究的目的是研究社区和学校环境如何构建青少年时期形成的浪漫和性关系。社区和学校塑造暴露于非正式的社会控制，早育的看法，以及对浪漫和性关系的信念。研究关系的形成过程和特点，以及社区和学校的结构方式，是更好地了解生殖健康和家庭形成的亚组变化的关键一步。虽然有大量的文献对邻里的影响，在较小程度上，学校的影响，对性和避孕行为，早育，性传播感染（STI），和一个小的，但越来越多的文献对这些结果的重要性的浪漫和性关系，没有以前的研究已经检查了邻里和学校环境在塑造这些浪漫和性关系的作用。建议调查邻里和学校环境，特别是这些环境的社会文化特征，影响选择的合作伙伴和类型的关系，在青春期形成的。为了实现我们的目标，我们将分析全国青少年健康纵向研究（添加健康）的第一波和第三波，其中包括青少年的邻里和学校环境以及青少年随后的关系经验的数据。具体目标是：（1）探讨社区和学校社会文化环境对青少年恋爱关系和性关系特征的影响;（2）探讨社区和学校社会文化环境对青少年恋爱关系和性关系特征的交互作用。拟议中的研究将使用生态计量方法来创建社区和学校的社会文化措施，并将采用多层次建模技术来解释数据的嵌套结构。 公共卫生相关性：了解青少年的浪漫关系和性关系，以及邻里和学校环境影响这些关系特征的方式与人口健康有关，因为这些早期生活经历影响他们的生殖健康，并为未来的家庭形成选择和行为奠定基础。研究结果将提供有关社区和学校在构建年轻人关系方面的作用的新信息，并将有利于旨在促进性健康和减少意外怀孕和性传播感染风险的政策和社区一级的方案战略。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The objective of the proposed research is to examine how neighborhood and school contexts structure the romantic and sexual relationships that are formed during adolescence. Neighborhoods and schools shape exposure to informal social control, perceptions of early childbearing, and beliefs about romantic and sexual relationships. Studying relationship formation processes and characteristics and the ways in which neighborhoods and schools structure them is a key step towards better understanding subgroup variation in reproductive health and family formation. Although there is a large literature on neighborhood effects, and to a lesser extent, school effects, on sexual and contraceptive behavior, early childbearing, and sexually transmitted infections (STIs), and a small but growing literature on the importance of romantic and sexual relationships for these outcomes, no prior research has examined the role of neighborhood and school contexts in shaping these romantic and sexual relationships. The proposed inquiry investigates how neighborhood and school contexts, specifically, the sociocultural characteristics of these contexts, influence the selection of partners and the types of relationships that are formed during adolescence. To achieve our objective, we will analyze Waves I and III of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), which includes data on adolescents' neighborhood and school contexts and on adolescents' subsequent relationship experiences. The specific aims are to: 1) investigate the effects of neighborhood and school sociocultural contexts on the characteristics of adolescents' romantic and sexual relationships; and 2) examine the interactive effects between neighborhood and school sociocultural contexts on the characteristics of adolescents' romantic and sexual relationships. The proposed study will use ecometric methods to create neighborhood and school sociocultural measures and will employ multilevel modeling techniques to account for the nested structure of the data. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Understanding adolescents' romantic and sexual relationships and the ways in which neighborhood and school contexts influence the characteristics of these relationships is relevant to population health because these early life course experiences affect their reproductive health and set the stage for future family formation choices and behaviors. The study findings will provide new information regarding the role of neighborhoods and schools in structuring young people's relationships and will benefit policy and community-level programmatic strategies aimed at promoting sexual health and reducing the risk of unintended pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections.