Assessment of Exposure to Sexually Explicit Materials and Substance Abuse among High-School Adolescents in North Shewa Zone: Application of Logistic Regression Analysis

Abstract

Background. The use of substances such as cigarettes, khat, alcohol, and other illicit drugs like hashish, heroine, cannabis, and cocaine is a global major public threat, which affects young adult people particularly in developing countries. This study aims to assess the risk factors associated with substance use and exposure to sexually explicit materials among high-school adolescents in north Shewa zone, Oromia region. Method. A cross-sectional study was conducted to assess substance use and exposure to sexually explicit materials among high-school adolescents in North Shewa zone, Oromiya, Ethiopia, using a structured self-administered questionnaire adapted from the 2008 “Community That Care Youth Survey” for adolescent substance use and problem behaviors. The study used descriptive statistics and logistic regression analysis to identify the significant factors associated with substance use and exposure to sexually explicit materials among high school adolescents in the study area. Result. The prevalence of lifetime and current substance use was 47.7% (95% CI: 0.427, 0.527) and 30.4% (95% CI: 0.258, 0.350), respectively. 17.8% use khat in their life and 16.6% used khat in the past 30 days; 42.2% ever used alcohol and 26.1% currently uses alcohol; 4.8% and 4.5% used cigarette in lifetime and in the past 30 days, while 16.4% use other illicit drugs in lifetime and 8.4% use illicit drugs in the past 30 days, respectively. Distributions of substance use by sex indicate that male adolescents are more like likely 61.1% use substances than females. While, the prevalence of exposure to sexually explicit materials among high school adolescents was 35.8% (95% CI: 0.310, 0.406). Factors positively associated with increased substance use were being male (OR = 2.334, 95% CI: 1.549, 9.926), living through high level of family conflict (OR = 6.25, 95% CI: 1.745, 10.00), poor family management OR = 27.084, 95% CI: 1.624, 45.56), peer pressure (OR = 12.882, 95% CI: 1.882, 88.153), poor academic performance (OR = 14.48, 95% CI: 1.290, 162.58), and low school commitment (OR = 11.951, 95% CI: 1.418, 100.73). While, being male (OR = 7.52, 95% CI: 2.611, 21.739), age 14–16 (OR = 0.201, 95% CI: 0.071, 0.565), friends watch/read sexually explicit materials (OR = 5.376, 95% CI: 1.010, 28.571), and khat chewing (OR = 12.5, 95% CI: 2.924, 25.632) were factors significantly associated with high-school adolescents exposure to sexually explicit materials. Conclusion. The magnitude of prevalence for substance uses and exposure to sexually explicit materials in the study area was still higher. Therefore, interventions that focus on family management, peer pressure, and school commitment are required to decrease the prevalence of substance uses and exposure to sexually explicit materials among high-school adolescents.

Adolescents’ Online Pornography Exposure and Its Relationship to Sociodemographic and Psychopathological Correlates: A Cross-Sectional Study in Six European Countries

“…A strong finding of our study was the consistent existence of significant gender effects across participating countries, replicating a finding of previous research [21,28,29,[36][37][38][39][40]. A much higher proportion of adolescent males than females reported exposure to pornography in the last 12 months, and this pattern held true for both any/occasional exposure and frequent exposure.…”

“…Adolescents' exposure to pornography is influenced by a range of developmental, social, demographic, psychological, and educational factors. Most studies have shown that male adolescents used pornography more often than their female counterparts [3,21,32,33,[36][37][38][39][40][41][42]. However, gender differences in exposure to pornography were not shown in more liberal countries [38,[43][44][45].…”

Substance Use and Associated Factors Among Medical Students at the University of Gondar, Northwest Ethiopia

“…Respondents coming from an area where substance is commonly used were found an associated factors for substance use which is similar to other studies conducted at Jimma University medical interns (15,32).Under this study, having a friend who uses a substance is signi cantly associated (p < 0.05) with current substance use which is supported by other two studies conducted in Jimma (15,32). Moreover, the study conducted among at north Shewa high school adolescent students indicated that friend substance use experience had an effect on starting substance (30).Overall, this study revealed that substance abuse was found common among intern and resident medical students at the University of Gondar. The magnitude of this prevalence was comparably similar to other studies.…”

“…Enjoyment (39%) was a major reason for starting substance use which is consistent with the study done in central Ethiopia and the prevalence of alcohol taking, khat chewing, and cigarette smoking was higher than the study done at Debre berhan undergraduate students (28).This difference may be because the study participants at Debre berhan were at all students level but in the current study setting medical students were the only respondents all may be passing through learning and social stress due to extended class schedule and lower than the study conducted at American medical students (91%) (29).Under this study, age was an associated factor for substance use which is inconsistent with the study conducted at Jimma University medical interns (15).This inconsistency may be due to study area setting differences resulting in environmental and family background variation. In other studies age was found a signi cantly associated with substance use (30)In addition, family history of substance use had association with current substance use which is also found a predictor by two other studies (15,31).…”

Prevalence of Cigarette Smoking and Associated Factors Among Adolescents in Eastern Ethiopia, 2020

“…This study was also found to be high when compared to previous studies done in Ethiopia's urban and rural areas (3%), Bale (4.6%), Shewa (4.5%), Northwest Ethiopia (6.8%), and Eastern Africa (9.02%). [22][23][24][25][26] Previous studies were conducted in academic institutions such as high schools, colleges, and universities. In addition, this study was conducted in eastern Ethiopia, where khat chewing and tobacco use are common, and our study was a population-based study that only included adolescents from the urban.…”