Contraceptive and condom use
Age differences
The Youth’07 Survey found that use of contraception among sexually active young people tended to increase with age.
For example, among sexually active males, those aged 13 or under (81.1 percent) were less likely than those aged 17 or older (67.5 percent) to report that they always use contraception most or all of the time as protection against pregnancy. However, few of the observed differences in condom and contraception use by age and sex were statistically significant, so the data below should be interpreted with caution.
| Used a condom last time had sexual intercourse | Always use contraception | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| % (95% CI) |
% (95% CI) |
|||
| Age (years) | Male | Female | Male | Female |
| 12 and 13 | 78.4 | 85.7 | 53.1 | 54.7 |
| (69.4, 87.4) | (78.4, 92.7) | (45.5, 60.8) | (45.2, 64.2) | |
| 14 | 76.7 | 74.9 | 57.4 | 60.6 |
| (70.9, 82.4) | (69.0, 80.8) | (52.1, 62.7) | (53.5, 67.8) | |
| 15 | 78.4 | 68.8 | 65.4 | 50.4 |
| (72.1, 84.6) | (64.1, 73.5) | (59.2, 56.4) | (44.5, 56.4) | |
| 16 | 77.3 | 67.9 | 68.7 | 65.8 |
| (72.4, 82.1) | (62.8, 72.9) | (63.8, 73.6) | (59.9, 71.8) | |
| 17 and 18 | 73.1 | 59.5 | 67.5 | 66.0 |
| (67.2, 78.9) | (54.2, 64.7) | (61.5, 73.5) | (59.2, 72.7) | |
| Total 12 to 18 | 76.5 | 68.8 | 63.3 | 59.7 |
| (73.7, 79.3) | (66.2, 71.3) | (60.7, 65.8) | (56.1, 63.4) | |
Source: Adolescent Health Research Group (2003) New Zealand Youth: A profile of their health and wellbeing. Auckland, University of Auckland.
Note: “95%CI” (95 percent confidence interval) signifies that there is a 95 percent chance that the true value falls within this range. If the respective confidence intervals (in brackets) do not overlap, the difference between rates is likely to be statistically significant.
