Knowledge and Attitude towards Teenage Pregnancy among Adolescent Students of selected Urban and Rural Schools of East Sikkim

Abstract

Pregnant teenagers face many of the same pregnancy related issues as other women. On a global level, 95% of the adolescents (aged 15–19) gives birth a child which take place in developing countries. Every year, some 3 million girls in this age bracket resort to unsafe abortion, risking their lives and health. The primary purpose of this study was to explore the knowledge and attitude towards teenage pregnancy among adolescent students of urban and rural schools. The study also planned to make a comparison on the level of knowledge and attitude among the adolescents of urban and rural areas. Investigators adopted quantitative approach with non-experimental descriptive survey research design where 200 adolescent school students were selected through non-probability purposive sampling technique from selected urban and rural schools of Gangtok, East Sikkim. Structured knowledge questionnaire regarding teenage pregnancy and attitude scale were used to collect data on adolescents’ knowledge and attitude towards teenage pregnancy for which validity and reliability was ensured. The finding of the study shows that out of 100 samples in urban school 71% had average knowledge,14% had good knowledge and 15% had poor knowledge regarding teenage pregnancy whereas among the 100 samples in rural school, 65% had average knowledge, 32% had good knowledge and 0.3% had poor knowledge regarding teenage pregnancy. Among the samples of urban school, 79% had unfavorable attitude and 21% had favorable attitude towards teenage pregnancy. Among the samples of rural school, 57% had unfavorable attitude and e43% had favorable attitude towards teenage pregnancy. There was no significant relationship between knowledge towards teenage pregnancy and selected demographic variables (as seen by χ² value P<0.05) except for education of mother (among the urban school students) and gender (among the rural school students). There was no significant relationship between attitude towards teenage pregnancy and selected demographic variables (as seen by χ² value p<0.05) except for gender (among the urban school students).

Keywords: Adolescents students, attitude towards teenage pregnancy, knowledge regarding teenage pregnancy, rural school, selected urban school, teenage pregnancy