The Role of Gender Differences and Familial Support in Sexual Health Knowledge: Impacts on Sexual Communication Self-Efficacy and Self-Awareness Among College Students

The sex education system in the U.S. leaves many young people with gaps in their knowledge regarding sexuality, their bodies, and communication surrounding sex. Through the framework of social cognitive theory (SCT; Bandura, 1986), this study seeks to explore how gender differences and familial support can impact sexual health knowledge and how this knowledge can affect sexual communication, specifically as it relates to self- awareness and self-efficacy. The results demonstrated that women score signficanly higher than men in sexual health knowledge and those that had more familiar support scored higher in sexual health knowledge. Additionally, those with more sexual health knowledge had higher levels of sexual communication self-efficacy and sexual self-awareness. Future research should consider examining sexual health knowledge as it relates to other populations and more diverse college campuses.