Respect: a core issue of sexual and reproductive health of young people

Abstract

Many core concepts of sexual and reproductive health (SRH) have been studied in a limited way. This applies to the concept respect, explored in this article in connection with the sexual and reproductive health of young people. At the international conference on population and development by the United Nations in Cairo in 1994 the emphasis on SRH was stressed (United Nations, 1995). It has, however, taken some time to move in the direction of SRHealth instead of remaining anchored in the problem-oriented way of thinking which frequently evolved around issues such as unplanned pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections. In Iceland, as well as in other societies, there are many signs of disrespect towards the sexual being and the MeToo revolution provides one of the most obvious examples of this. Also, recent trends in the misuse of smartphones by sending sexual pictures and videos to others without consent are causing considerable harm to the victims. There has been an increasing awareness over the years that nowadays societies are no longer ready to tolerate sexual violence of any sort. Based on the health approach and the signs of disrespect within contemporary society there is a need to pause and explore core life values such as respect in relation to the wellness of the sexual being.

This article is based on a secondary analysis of two Icelandic qualitative studies and two MeToo descriptions by Icelandic women. The purpose of the study is to explore how respect and disrespect are presented regarding the SRH of young people in Icelandic society. In the introduction the concept of respect is explored along with the sexual rights of young people. These rights have been developed by international organizations such as International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF, 2008), World Association for Sexual Health (WAS, 2014) and World Health Organization (WHO, 2016). These two core concepts (respect and rights) are presented as the cornerstones of the SRH model. The rights are based on respect towards the human being as demonstrated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations in 1948 (United Nations, 1948). The findings of this study show that the common threads of respect are human understanding, respecting the views of others, listening to others and respecting equality, boundaries and consent. Based on this study, showing respect in different ways is of importance in contributing to the wellness of the individual. Likewise, the main threads of disrespect are demonstrated by a negative attitude towards women, lack of safety, equality and freedom to decide (give consent). According to the study, when someone exhibits disrespectful behavior this is likely to contribute to a sense of unwellness. Finally, the need to understand healthy sexual relationships in order to prevent sexual violence of any sort is being discussed. There is a need to explore, as Debnam and coworkers (2014) did, how adolescent girls understand a healthy sexual relationship and examining the perspectives of adolescent boys towards the phenomenon is also of great importance. In order to move in the direction of gender equality and healthier sexual relationships the perspectives of both girls and boys are needed. Such information is valuable for the development of sexuality education. It is also necessary to understand what kind of intervention or interventions can be effective in the classroom to prevent sexual violence of any sort within sexual relationships of adolescents and young people. Such a study is on its way in the United Kingdom and its findings can possibly guide others towards promising interventions in the schools in the near future (Meiksin et al., 2019). Based on the importance of preventing sexual violence in sexual relationships, a holistic sexuality education program has been available in Iceland since 2011 emphasizing healthy sexual relationships for young people in the age group 16–18. The program has been evaluated although this aspect has not been specifically explored.

This article provides information about the concept of respect. This can be of value for the ongoing development of measurements regarding respect in sexual relationships, and also for improving SRH programs for young people in schools by emphasizing respect in sexual relationships. Also, the conceptual model of SRH may inspire researchers to empirically test the whole model or its parts.