Krnacik, Kara Lee2020-09-292020-09-292020https://hdl.handle.net/1794/2576964 pagesThe federal government began providing funding for abstinence-only sexual education in the 1980s to decrease teen pregnancy and poverty in the United States. In the last two decades a significant body of research has found that comprehensive sexual education is more effective than abstinence-only sexual education to obtain lower teen pregnancy rates and improve teen physical and mental health. This study investigates the effects of states rejecting federal funding from the Title V Abstinence-Only Until Marriage Program on teen health and behavioral outcomes. I hypothesize that these outcomes will improve upon the rejection of Title V funding. This research utilizes a quasi-experimental difference-in-difference econometric model to estimate the effects of the rejection of Title V funding on contraceptive use, sexually transmitted disease (STD) rates, and birth rates in teens of high school age in the United States. The data that this research utilizes comes from the Centers for Disease Control and the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States. The results indicate that rejection of Title V funding is correlated with small statistically significant increases in contraceptive use rates and inconclusive changes in STD and teen birth rates. These results are in line with those of previous research done in this field, and also add to the few studies that have investigated the effects of state-level sexual education policy on teen health and behavioral outcomes. This study highlights the complexity of federal funding for sexual education and the need for evidence-based policy when determining sexual education curriculum.en-USEconomicsAbstinence-Only EducationTeen Health OutcomesTeen Behavioral OutcomesThesis/Dissertation