Perceptions of sex education among college students: A case study of a medical school

Table 1 Survey and analysis results of medical students’ sexual knowledge by medical students of different specialties (your understanding of sexual knowledge before adulthood comes from)

Major	In school sex		Parent		Internet		Wordofmouth		Books		Others		Total
	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)
Clinical medicine	160	20.83	58	7.55	292	38.02	169	22.01	85	11.07	4	0.52	768
Oral medicine	47	26.11	24	13.33	61	33.89	26	14.44	22	12.22		0.00	180
Anesthesiology	42	20.79	19	9.41	70	34.65	37	18.32	32	15.84	2	0.99	202
Medical imaging	23	24.73	6	6.45	31	33.33	22	23.66	11	11.83		0.00	93
Medical laboratory technology	27	25.96	12	11.54	33	31.73	18	17.31	12	11.54	2	1.92	104
Preventive medicine	25	32.05	9	11.54	23	29.49	12	15.38	9	11.54		0.00	78
Biotechnology	13	23.64	7	12.73	18	32.73	10	18.18	7	12.73		0.00	55
Psychiatry	32	23.36	15	10.95	48	35.04	25	18.25	16	11.68	1	0.73	137
Health inspection and quarantine	22	22.92	6	6.25	33	34.38	24	25.00	11	11.45		0.00	96
Traditional Chinese medicine	22	25.58	14	16.28	24	27.91	17	19.77	9	10.47		0.00	86
Nursing (including major upgrade to undergraduate level)	24	22.02	11	10.09	35	32.11	22	20.18	16	14.58	1	0.92	109
Midwifery	22	30.14	8	10.96	26	35.62	10	13.70	7	9.59		0.00	73
Geriatric care and management	12	22.22	8	14.81	16	29.63	8	14.81	10	18.52		0.00	54
Food quality and safety	18	31.03	8	13.79	17	29.31	11	18.97	4	6.90		0.00	58
Medical information engineering	15	27.78	5	9.26	17	31.48	11	20.37	6	11.11		0.00	54
Pharmacy	30	23.44	10	7.81	43	33.59	27	21.09	18	14.06		0.00	128
Rehabilitation therapy (including rehabilitation therapy techniques)	36	22.50	15	9.28	55	34.38	35	21.88	19	11.88		0.00	160
Bioinformatics	8	22.22	5	13.89	12	33.33	7	19.44	4	11.11		0.00	36
Total	578	23.39	240	9.71	854	34.56	491	19.87	298	12.06	10	0.40	2471

Table 2 Survey results of the educational stage of understanding of sexual knowledge for medical students by specialty (when did you know something about sexual knowledge?)

Major	Primary school (under 12 years old)	Junior high school (12-15 years old)	Senior high school (15-18 years old)	University	Total
Clinical medicine	96	241	76	17	430
Stomatology major	23	49	15	6	93
Anesthesiology major	24	58	22	8	112
Medical imaging	15	22	10	3	50
Medical laboratory technology	11	34	12	2	59
Preventive medicine	10	21	9	1	41
Biotechnology	9	15	6	1	31
Psychiatry	18	41	7	2	68
Health inspection and quarantine	7	26	10	4	47
Traditional Chinese medicine	9	22	13	1	45
Nursing (including upgrading to undergraduate level)	18	24	16	2	60
Midwifery	8	24	5	5	42
Geriatric care management	7	12	3	3	25
Food quality and safety	4	15	10	3	32
Medical information engineering	4	13	8	1	26
Pharmacy	16	27	12	4	59
Rehabilitation therapy (including rehabilitation therapy techniques)	22	38	21	4	85
Bioinformatics	1	13	4	0	18
Total	302	695	259	67	1323

Table 3 Results of a survey of medical students on sexual responsibility by age group (whether you approve of premarital sex)

Age	Approval		Oppose		Total
	Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)
18-20 years old	437	37.00	744	63.00	1181
21-22 years old	84	47.73	92	52.27	176
Total	521	38,39	836	61.61	1357

Table 4 Results of a survey of medical students on sexual responsibility by age group (what do you think is the relationship between sex and responsibility between men and women?)

Age	If you don’t get pregnant, you don’t need to be responsible for the opposite sex		Having sex should be responsible for each other		There is no direct relationship between sex and responsibility		Total
	Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)
18-20 years old	39	3.30	933	79	209	17.70	1181
21-22 years old	7	3.98	127	72.16	42	23.86	176
Total	46	3.39	1060	78.11	251	18.50	1357

Table 5 Results of a survey of medical students on sexual responsibility by age group (do you think men and women have equal sexual responsibilities today?)

Age	Equal		Unequal, women are more responsible		More responsibility for men		Total
	Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)
18-20 years old	728	61.64	195	16.51	258	21.85	1181
21-22 years old	104	59.09	35	19.89	37	21.02	176
Total	832	61.31	230	16.95	295	21.74	1357

Table 6 Results of statistical analysis of sexual responsibility among medical students at different ages

		Sex	Sexual responsibility	Premarital sex
Sex	Pearson	1	-0.014	0.13
	Sig.	-	0.615	< 0.01
Sexual responsibility	Pearson	-0.014	1	0.003
	Sig.	0.615	-	0.901
Premarital sex	Pearson	0.13	0.003	1
	Sig.	< 0.01	0.901	-

Table 7 Survey results on sexual responsibility among medical students in different specialties (do you approve of premarital sex?)

Professional	Agree		Disagree		Total
	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)
Clinical medicine	183	42.56	247	57.44	430
Oral medicine	37	39.78	56	60.22	93
Anesthesiology	46	41.07	66	58.93	112
Medical imaging	19	38.00	31	62.00	50
Medical laboratory technology	22	37.29	37	62.71	59
Preventive medicine	13	31.71	28	68.29	41
Biotechnology	10	32.26	21	67.74	31
Psychiatry	27	39.71	41	60.29	68
Health inspection and quarantine	11	23.40	36	76.60	47
Traditional Chinese medicine	12	26.67	33	73.33	45
Nursing (including major upgrade to undergraduate level)	25	41.67	35	58.33	60
Midwifery	16	38.10	26	61.90	42
Geriatric care management	10	40.00	15	60.00	25
Food quality and safety	5	15.63	27	84.38	32
Medical information engineering	12	46.15	14	53.85	26
Pharmacy	31	52.54	28	47.46	59
Rehabilitation therapy (including rehabilitation therapy techniques)	24	28.24	61	71.76	85
Bioinformatics	4	22.22	14	77.78	18
Total	507	38.32	816	61.68	1323

Table 8 Survey and analysis of gender-specific knowledge of medical students (do you know about acuteness wet wart, syphilis, cervical cancer, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, and other sexual diseases?)

	Sufficient understanding		Not much		Not at all		Total
	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)	Number	Proportion (%)
Male	141	32.05	252	52.27	47	10.68	440
Female	126	13.74	697	76.01	94	10.25	917
Total	267	19.68	949	69.93	141	10.39	1357

Table 9 Results of the survey on the distress of medical students about sexuality (are you sexually confused and ashamed to communicate with others?)

	Frequency	Yes		No		Total
		Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)
Are you curious about sexual matters?	Often	55	40.74	80	59.26	135
	Occasionally	180	27.48	475	72.52	655
	Once or twice	44	27.16	118	72.84	162
	None	58	14.32	347	85.68	405
		337	24.83	1020	75.17	1357

Table 10 Results of an analysis of the survey on the dissemination of sexual knowledge among parents (do you think sex education is necessary in schools?)

		It is necessary		There is no need because your own knowledge is enough
		Quantity	Proportion (%)	Quantity	Proportion (%)
What is your parent’s identity to you when it comes to sexuality?	Teacher, there are warnings about taboos, and I don’t want to talk about it more, but I have said everything that should be said	411	31.51	49	3.76
	Guard, don’t talk much, and will make up stories in a hurry	246	18.87	36	2.76
	Friends, who can talk at any time, will hint at what you shouldn’t do, and have a subtle impact	472	36.20	70	5.37
	Other	12	0.92	8	0.61
	Total	1141	87.50	163	12.5