Infant and Child Sexuality: A Sociological Perspective - Ipce

variation in age, it is difficult for the school to give instructions
at the “right time.” Shipman found that the girls wished their mothers
had played a part in such teaching. It was not so much the information
as the affective support that they desired from their mothers.
The following cases represent sex education provided in encounters
with the parent--sex education which the preadolescent regards as having
been positive and satisfactory. It is generally agreed by sex educators
that the number of cases in which the parents give adequate sex
instruction is far outstripped in number by those in which the instruction
is not adequate in terms of attitude, values, or information. The
following cases illustrate that it can be done.
I would say that 95 percent of my sex education has
come from my mother. She has told me in such a
beautiful way that sex has not become ugly in my
eyes.
As a result of this broad sex education (her mother
told her ‘everything’), I never believed any of the
perverted and misleading ideas about sex.
After that talk, I (a seventh grade girl who went
to her mother for sex instruction) have been very
close to my mother. She has been like a sister to
me in that I have been able to talk over anything
and everything with her.
My formal sex education from my father came when I
(a boy) was in the fifth grade. We had very little
difficulty with terms and his explanation of various
reproductive organs and their correct scientific
names was very easy to understand. I became
aware of the fact that the male produced sperm
which was carried by semen and that I could expect
to have nocturnal emissions as I grew older. He
explained this was normal and a part of maturing,
that my mother would understand completely the
soiling of pajamas and bedsheets. These nocturnal
emissions, he explained, would be caused by a
buildup of the sperm supply and would serve to
relieve the pressure. Even though he didn’t go into
the mechanics of masturbation, he left me with the
feeling that the pressure build-up was normal and
that it was nothing shameful if it was relieved.
Even most of this information was given in an
unemotional technical language. I was aware that
the joys of this act were a part of love and marriage.
This was especially evidenced by the fact
that the term love was used interchangeably with
the word intercourse. My father also explained the
menstrual patterns of girls and told me that sometimes
their emotional make-up is changed during
these times. He also explained that young girls go
through a special emotional change with the onset
of menstruation and that one of the cruelest things
to do would be to tease them about it. Thus my for-
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