In some states, those with high Mormon populations, teenagers are married. And so that doesn’t represent the rest of the country. So these individuals are excluded.
But why are those not interesting for their data? It kinda feels like the question they want to answer is “how many teenager are sinners having premarital sex” rather than the average age of first sex. Which would also mean that lots of teenagers would feel encouraged to claim that they’re virgins when they actually aren’t.
daannii@lemmy.world 1 week ago
It’s exclusion criteria.
In some states, those with high Mormon populations, teenagers are married. And so that doesn’t represent the rest of the country. So these individuals are excluded.
rumschlumpel@feddit.org 1 week ago
But why are those not interesting for their data? It kinda feels like the question they want to answer is “how many teenager are sinners having premarital sex” rather than the average age of first sex. Which would also mean that lots of teenagers would feel encouraged to claim that they’re virgins when they actually aren’t.
daannii@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Because that would be a different study.
You could compare their behaviors to non married teens or whatever else.
Or compare the homosexual and bi teens to hetero ones.
I’m sure such studies do exist.
But you can’t just have all these wild card variables lumped together.
In research you have to try to use parameters that best represent a population if you are doing a study on general trends.
It’s very common to exclude anyone who isn’t “average” from a study on average behaviors.