ABSTRACT
The study was to investigate knowledge and Attitude towards Risky Sexual Behaviour among undergraduate students in the University of Benin. To achieve the purpose of the study four (4) research questions were posed to guide the study.
Literature pertinent to the study was reviewed. It was clear that students engaged in risky sexual behaviour which are detrimental to their health and well-being.
The descriptive survey design was adopted for this study and a simple random sampling technique was used to select 7 faculties and a purposively sampling technique – 5% of respondents was selected from each of the selected faculties. Thus, the sample size for this study was 1,181 respondents. The research instrument was given to the researcher’s project supervisor and two other experts. Corrections made were incorporated into the instrument. To achieving the reliability of the instrument, the test re-test method was employed; thus, a correlation coefficient of 0.724 was obtained which indicated that the instrument was reliable. The instrument used for data collection was the researcher- designed questionnaire.
The findings revealed that most of the respondents are knowledgeable on the statements raised in research question one as a number of them answered correctly the knowledge questions asked. It further revealed that most of the respondents had different attitude towards risky sexual behaviour as raised in research question two. It was clear that majority of the respondents agreed on the following statements; “It is possible for girls to remain virgin until marriage”, “Boys put girls under pressure to have sex”, “Condoms reduce sexual pleasure”, and “Girls don’t use condom because they trust their partners”. While the following statements was disagreed by majority of the respondents, “condoms are not good for adolescents because it encourages them to have sex”, and “it is possible to talk with parents about sex”. Respondents exhibited different risky practices as seen from the statements raised in research question three. These practices include having a boyfriend/girlfriend, engaging in risky sexual practices for financial benefits, having multiple sexual partners, using alcohol or drugs before or during sex, gone out to bars/parties/social events with the intent of ‘‘hooking up” and having sex with someone and lastly, during the first 18 years of one’s life, someone actually had oral, anal, or vaginal sex without one’s consent. And lastly, there is no gender differences in response to risky sexual behaviour as seen on research question four. Findings revealed that both genders relatively share same views on majority of the statements raised. It was however, recommended that, Educative information and preventive measures of risky sexual behaviour should become necessary from the departmental level across the other faculties in the institution.
