Teenagers who engage in sexual intercourse are more likely to suffer from depression and attempt suicide than teens who are abstinent, according to a study.

The findings are especially significant for young girls. About 25 percent of sexually active girls say they are depressed all, most, or a lot of the time, compared to eight percent of girls who are not sexually active.

The study used selected federal data on 2,800 students aged between 14 and 17 years. The youth were not diagnosed as clinically depressed but rather rated their own "general state of continuing unhappiness."

Researchers noted that they did not find a causal link between unhappiness and sexual activity, as that would be nearly impossible to prove.

The study found that about 14 percent of girls who have had intercourse have attempted suicide compared with five percent of girls who have not had intercourse.

About six percent of sexually active boys have attempted suicide compared with less than one percent of sexually inactive boys.

According to researchers, the findings send a different message from the one portrayed by popular culture, in which "all forms of non-marital sexual activity are wonderful and glorious, and the younger the teen the better."

USA Today June 3, 2003

The abstinence message is beginning to get through to teenagers.

Mainline doctors are taking note of the epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases and the NIH study that showed the ineffectiveness of condoms in preventing chlamydia, gonorrhea in women, genital herpes, syphilis, chancroid and the human papillomavirus