The use of role-play in sexuality education: An integrative review

Objective: Although role-play is a common pedagogic strategy in sexuality education, there has been little guidance to help educators in crafting and facilitating effective role-plays. This integrative review summarises existing literature on the effects and effectiveness of role-play, who may benefit from role-play, and what guidelines exist to aid in the facilitation of role-play in the context of sexuality education. Method: An integrative review was conducted, identifying a total of 34 relevant articles published between 1981 and 2024. Results: Overall, role-play was found to be a recommended and effective pedagogic strategy in sexuality education. However, the research literature highlights that educators often have difficulties facilitating and engaging students in effective role-play. Conclusion: Review findings suggest that educators would benefit from greater support in facilitating effective role-play. The principles of good practice identifiable in the existing literature can be summarised via the acronym GAMED: educators should set clear Guidelines, make Adaptations for the target population, Model effective engagement, Encourage participation and Debrief with students following the role-play. Future research may benefit from empirically evaluating guidelines such as these, and developing strategies to aid educators facilitate the challenging but promising pedagogic strategy of role-play.