Sexual initiation and sexual health behaviours among young adults in Ireland

The experience of sexual intercourse for the first time is a significant life event, and influenced by a range of individual, cultural and societal factors. Age of first sexual initiation is a major area of policy and research focus, as the circumstances of first sex (e.g. whether contraception was used, whether it was perceived to have occurred ‘at the right time’), and the consequences of first sex for later outcomes (e.g. diagnoses of sexually transmitted infections (STIs), early parenthood), have important implications for health and wellbeing. In this report, we use data from the ’98 Cohort of Growing Up in Ireland (GUI), the national longitudinal study of children and young people in Ireland, to examine the factors associated with age of sexual initiation among young adults, and the way in which age of first sex influences the circumstances of first sex and selected outcomes. Age and circumstances of first sex, and selected outcomes, are all based on data collected during the fourth wave of data collection for the ’98 Cohort of GUI, when the young people were 20 years of age.