A social learning model of adolescent contraceptive behavior

Central to an understanding of adolescent pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease prevention is the study of birth control use among teenagers. This paper critically reviews both recent research findings and dominant theories regarding adolescent contraceptive use. An alternative theoretical framework, one that relies on social learning theory, is offered. This framework uses three major components — environmental context, cognitive influences, and behavior execution constraints — as the foundation for understanding the learning and maintenance of contraceptive behaviors. First, environmental factors, such as the availability of role models, accurate sexuality education, and birth control services, are seen as supporting or inhibiting birth control use. Second, the importance of cognitive functions through which the external environment is viewed and which influence the adolescent's image of the consequences associated with contraceptive use are highlighted. Last, the actual behavioral skills teenagers need in order to use birth control successfully are considered.Received D.S.W. in Social Welfare from the University of California — Berkeley. Research interests are adolescent reproductive health, contraceptive use, and prevention of pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.     

Reviews

Women writing in India

Susie Tharu and K. Lalita (eds), Women Writing in India — 600 B. C. to the Present; Volume 1: 600 B. C. to the Early Twentieth Century (The Feminist Press, City University of New York) New York, 1991.

Poststructuralism and politics

Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (Routledge) New York and London, 1990; Rosalyn Diprose and Robyn Ferrell (eds), Cartographies: Poststructuralism and the Mapping of Bodies and Spaces (Allen and Unwin) Sydney, 1991; Nancy Fraser, Unruly Practices: Power, Discourse and Gender in Contemporary Social Theory (University of Minnesota Press) Minneapolis, 1989.

Postponed lives, secondary data and pushing our own barrow

Laura S. Brown and Esther D. Rothblum (eds), Fat Oppression and Psychotherapy: A Feminist Perspective (Haworth Press) New York, 1989; Helen Roberts (ed.), Women's Health Counts (Routledge) London, 1990; Health Sharing Women, The Health Sharing Reader: Women Speak about Health (Pandora) Sydney, 1990.

Primatology and feminism

Donna Haraway, Primate Visions (Routledge) New York, 1989, distributed by the Law Book Company Limited.

Domestic violence

Heather McGregor and Andrew Hopkins, Working for Change: The Movement Against Domestic Violence (Allen and Unwin) Sydney, 1991; Jan Horsfall, The Presence of the Past: Male Violence in the Family (Allen and Unwin) Sydney, 1991.

Feminist strategies and the state

Clare Burton, The Promise and the Price (Allen and Unwin) Sydney, 1991; Hester Eisenstein, Gender Shock (Allen and Unwin) Sydney, 1991; Gretchen Poiner and Sue Wills, The Gifthorse (Allen and Unwin) Sydney, 1991; Margaret Thornton, The Liberal Promise (Oxford University Press) Oxford, 1990.     

Book reviews

Hélène Carrère d'Encausse, Une Révolution, une victoire. L'union soviétique de Lénine à Staline 1917–1953. Paris: Editions Richelieu, 1972. 446 pp. 60 F.

Joel C. Moses, Regional Party Leadership and Policy‐Making in the USSR. (Praeger Special Studies in International Politics and Government.) New York: Praeger Publishers, 1974, and London: Pall Mall Press, 1975. xv+263 pp. £8.00.

Robert J. Osborn, The Evolution of Soviet Politics. Homewood, Ill. and London: The Dorsey Press, 1974. xiii+574 pp. $10.95.

Robert H. Donaldson, Soviet Policy toward India: Ideology and Strategy. (Russian Research Center Studies, 74.) Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard UP, 1974. x+338 pp. £7.50.

Lloyd G. Churchward, Contemporary Soviet Government. Second Edition. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1975. 368 pp. £6.95.

Otto Ul?, Politics in Czechoslovakia. San Francisco and Reading: W. H. Freeman, 1975. xi+181 pp. £4.70.

Ivan Volgyes (ed.), Environmental Deterioration in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. (Praeger Special Studies in International Politics and Government.) New York: Praeger, 1974, and London: Pall Mall Press, 1975. xiii+168 pp. $14.00. £6.00.

Rolf Freund, Investitionskriterien als Mittel zur Realisierung eines Entwick‐lungspfades. Dargestellt am Beispiel der UdSSR. Berlin: Osteuropa‐Institut an der Freien Universität Berlin, 1974. v+202 pp. DM 12.00.

László Szamuely, First Models of the Socialist Economic Systems. Principles and Theories. Budapest: Akadémiai Kiádó, 1974. 109 pp. £2.60.

Iain F. Elliot, The Soviet Energy Balance. Natural Gas, Other Fossil Fuels, and Alternative Power Sources. (Praeger Special Studies in Economics and Development.) New York: Praeger Publishers, 1974, and London: Pall Mall Press, 1975. xv+277 pp. £8.00.     

Who's the Boss? Patterns of Perceived Control in Adolescents' Friendships

This study examined the nature and correlates of different patterns of perceived control in adolescents' relationships with their best friends. Participants included firstborn adolescents (M = 14.94 years), their younger siblings (M = 12.44 years) and both their mothers and fathers in 163 families as well as a best friend of each adolescent (M = 15 years). Data were collected from family members during home visits regarding adolescents' family relationships, friendships, and psychosocial adjustment; time use data were gathered during a series of 7 nightly phone interviews. Information was obtained from best friends during a brief phone interview. We developed a typology of 3 different patterns of perceived friendship control based on the combination of adolescents' and their best friends' ratings of relational control. Patterns of control in adolescents' friendships were associated with the distribution of control in both parents' marriages and adolescents' sibling relationships. Further analyses, designed to test developmental predictions, revealed connections between friendship control and other qualities of adolescents' friendships (i.e., intimacy, conflict, perspective-taking).