Is this really a surprise?

A federal study found that teenagers who pledged abstinence are just as likely to have premarital sex as those who do not make the pledge, HealthDay News reported.

Those teenagers who originally made the pledge are significantly less likely to use condoms or birth control than teens who did not make the pledge.

Abstinence makes the heart grow fonder...

"And five years after making the pledge, 80 percent of pledgers denied making such a promise." From the article

The sample was 900 or so high school students, and the above statement already suggests that their statements cannot be trusted. As I should hope that the government's researchers were not in the bedrooms with a video camera, this data is based on self-reporting from a group notorious for it's dishonesty. Consider the estimates, bmd, as a college professor, of the percentage of students who cheat on exams.

I struggle to find how you can find a study of 934 high school students who were already abstaining can be, for you, authoritative.

"Rosenbaum said she compared teens who had taken a virginity pledge with similar teens who had not taken a pledge, but were apt to delay having sex."

There are a hundred reasons that people do not have sex in high school. Some of them do not for ethical reasons, others because they are socially inept with the opposite sex, and still others becasue they are aware of the risks involved. Taking 934 students who have already admitted to you that they have not committed the no no cha cha (and then taking them at their word, incidentally), and then seeing what correlates with what, does not determine causation or even deterrence.

As I'm sure you are well aware, bmd, evangelical Christians tend to come from the less educated segments of society. Children of PhDs are quite likely to delay having sex compared to children of high school graduates, but for reasons other than taking virginity pledges. But if you were to control for education level of the parents of these teens, you might find that the pledges are more effective than they first appear to be.

A great many Star Trek conventioneers are not Christians, but I wager that they hit the love shack a little later in life than, say, the football team. Abstinence pledges may or may not make the respective situations any different.

At any rate, I should wonder why you would object so to people pledging not to have sex. Abstinence is very effective when IT'S ACTUALLY DONE (or NOT DONE), in many cases.

At any rate, I should wonder why you would object so to people pledging not to have sex. Abstinence is very effective when IT'S ACTUALLY DONE (or NOT DONE), in many cases.

Except few teens will actually stay celibate.

The pledges are NOT effective, as has been shown again and again.

Also, you get the situations where teens will say that oral and anal sex doesn't count as "sex".

Sure they won't get pregnant but they can get (and have) diseases.

STD's are VERY high among the "pledge" groups for that very reason - since they aren't really "doing it", they don't need protection.

If kids want to take their pledge, let them. They still need sex-ed.