Impact of social media usage on adolescent sexual and reproductive health

Abstract

One of the critical stages in life is adolescence, since it is associated with many changes and first experiences. Information on how to handle the many changes with their attending desires is very essential. Guidance and counselling services as well as parents’ involvement are equally important factors to the adolescent. Due to this, the phenomenon has received some empirical study attention, and researchers have reported that Social Media (eg. WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn) usage among adolescents is on the ascendancy. These social media platforms offer many possibilities for many forms of communication to take place. Many scholars have studied the phenomenon in different geographical locations, focusing on various aspects and have emerged with different findings. However, there is paucity in research on the impact of social media usage on sexual and reproductive health information sharing among adolescents in Ghana. We explored the impact of social media usage by adolescents in Ghana. We also examined the kinds of SRH information shared by adolescents on social media. Four hundred adolescents (social media users), between the ages of 13 and 19 were sampled for the study. The results revealed that majority of respondents share sexual and reproductive health information regarding personal experiences with their friends through social media. WhatsApp was the medium mostly used for sharing ‘sensitive’ SRH information, followed by Facebook. We also found that adolescents share a lot of SRH information on social media. These include condom use, sexual experiences, abortion and changes during adolescence. There were significant differences among male and female adolescents on the kinds of information shared on social media. The findings of the study have direct implication for policy direction regarding Sexual and Reproductive Health information accessibility among adolescents in Ghana. Implications for parental involvement, organisation of frequent SRH awareness events as well as implications for guidance and counselling were outlined. © European Conference on Social Media, ECSM 2020.