Youth Voices are Needed Now More than Ever to Improve Adolescent Sexual Health Research: Lessons from Five Years with a Youth Advisory Board

Youth Advisory Boards (YABs) can meaningfully incorporate youth voices into sexual health research with the combined benefits of leading to higher-quality, more effective research as well as providing YAB members with personal benefits such as exposure to scientific methods, research principles, and professional development opportunities. Previously published commentaries have outlined the experience of developing and maintaining a YAB in other areas of research and from a researcher perspective. This commentary, written by YAB members themselves, shares how they participated as equal co-creators in the development of a YAB for a sexual health study, what made it successful, and how other sexual health researchers can incorporate YABs into their own work.