“Not the sex talk;” next up in Ideas series

Lucia O’Sullivan speaks tonight in the Ideas that Matter series.

Hilary Paige Smith - News Editor The Brunswickan, April 6, 2011 - Photo: Mike Erb / The Brunswickan

Lucia O’Sullivan was clear. Her upcoming lecture in the Ideas that Matter series is not the “sex talk.”

It’s about technology.

O’Sullivan is a professor in the psychology department at UNB. Her research is primarily in the realm of adolescent sexual health in eastern Canada. Her talk “Tweeting, Texting, Teens and Chat: The Internet and Sex in the Lives of Youth” takes place tonight at 7 p.m. in the Tom Morrison Theatre at Fredericton High School.

The talk is taking place at FHS to maximize the number of parents who will be able to attend. The Ideas that Matter series isn’t just geared toward academic types. It’s meant to engage the community in provincial issues.
O’Sullivan will touch on sexting, cyber-bullying and internet communication.

“I think it’s fairly obvious that the internet world has really inundated our lives with computer mediated communication. Every day almost there is some story in the news about the impact of the internet on the sexual lives of young people and, as you might guess, there hasn’t been much research because it’s changing so quickly.”

O’Sullivan is in the process of researching the impact technology and its everyday use has on the sexual lives of youth.

The talk is primarily geared towards parents because there is a lot of hysteria and panic surrounding sex and technology from parents of teenagers.

O’Sullivan hopes to moderate some of the fear parents are expressing and give an update from her research.

“I never think there’s room for panic,” she said. “There’s always a lot of hysteria and panic around adolescent sexuality anyway. It is easily fueled by media stories indicating that children are vulnerable or victims of predators and stalkers and the like, when in real life, those events are really rare.”

The psychology professor believes parents should be involved and interested in these topics, but there is no need for panic.

The Ideas that Matter series is designed to shed light on topics that are important to New Brunswickers. O’Sullivan said New Brunswick has a decent track record for sexual statistics, as far as declining teen pregnancy and abortion rates go. Sexual lives in New Brunswick are not vastly different than other provinces across the country.

For more information on the Ideas that Matter series, visit www.unb.ca/ideas.