Little bits and pieces: the process of revealing sexual information in close mother-daughter relationships

Abstract

Sexual communication between parents and adolescents is believed to be challenging. Ample research has examined parent-adolescent sexual communication, but has been limited. The current study was designed to overcome some of the limitations of previous research by interviewing nine mothers and their 19 year old daughters together and separately. Using Communication Privacy Management theory (Petronio, 2002) as a backdrop, the results reconstruct the process of sexual communication in close mother-daughter relationships. Namely, communication about sex begins when children are young. Daughters come to learn more about sex as they get older and their mothers reveal sexual information in small increments over time.