Effectiveness of a Group Educational Program on the Knowledge, Attitude, and Participation Approach of Mothers in the Sex Education of Preschool Children
H Fatehi Pouladi, M Akbari Kamrani, M Javad Noori, M Farid, Student Research Committee, School of Medicine, Alborz University of Medical Sciences, Karaj, Iran, Assistant Professor, Social Determinants of Health Research Center, Alborz University of Medical Sciences, Karaj, Iran Tel: (+26) 34483105 Email: Dr.akbarikamrani@abzums.ac.ir, Associate Professor, Ahvaz University of Medical Sciences, Ahvaz, Iran, Assistant Professor, Non-Communicable Diseases Research Center, Alborz University of Medical Sciences, Karaj, Iran
2019
Iran Journal of Nursing
& Aim: preschool students are vulnerable to sexual abuse due to not being taught the proper anatomical names for their body parts. Sex education reduces child sexual abuse if provided based on age and cultural conditions and presenting accurate and appropriate information about body parts and functions of each of them. On the other hand, education by knowledgeable parents will lead to both successful training and increased self-confidence in children. Therefore, parents, especially mothers,
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... a pivotal role in the sex education of children, which shows the necessity of sex education by parents. The present study aimed to assess the effectiveness of a group educational program on the knowledge, attitude, and participation approach of mothers in the sex education of preschool children. Materials & Methods: This randomized, controlled, parallel clinical trial was conducted on 58 mothers with children aged 3-7 years employed at Alborz University of Medical Sciences in Karaj, Iran during May-September 2018. The inclusion criteria were being an employee at Alborz University of Medical Sciences, being a mother (or a guardian) of a child, being literate, literacy in Farsi language, and lack of attending child sex education courses in the past six months. On the other hand, the exclusion criteria were unwillingness to participate in the study and lack of participation in training sessions. Data were collected using a demographic form (nine items: child's gender, child's age, the birth rank of the child, number of children, maternal marital status and level of education, and paternal marital status and level of education) and a researcher-made questionnaire with three sections on maternal knowledge, attitude, and participation in the sex education of preschool children. The items of researcher-made tools were extracted from resources and related tools in the specialized field of preschool sexual education and based on the opinion of experts. In six-nine-member groups, the participants in the intervention group received three training sessions (90 minutes each) with 10-day intervals. In the intervention group, group education of mothers was carried out by a trained midwife under the supervision of a team of reproductive health professionals using methods such as brainstorming, one-on-one expression of experiences, animation, and summarizing similar problems of mothers in the field of child sex education. Finally, active learning was done in groups. The content of the sessions was, as follows: In the first session, the importance of the mother's role in sex education of children was emphasized and the topics include the concept of sex education, teaching the right techniques of communication with children, familiarization with physiology and sexual behaviors of children. In the second session, the main topics were common questions of children, evaluation of various child sex education methods used by parents, enlightenment and confronting irrational and superstitious thoughts, and evaluation of mothers' viewpoints. In the third session, the researchers focused on the education of skills to cope with and respond to curiosities and sexual behaviors and questions of children. In order to complete the discussed topics, an educational booklet was given to the members of the intervention group, and during the training sessions, reminders about completing the educational content were done with the help of cyberspace, SMS, and telephone calls for mothers. In addition, the researchers attempted to answer any questions raised by
doi:10.29252/ijn.32.119.12
fatcat:g73umfjsdjgfxarhy3z53vdcse
