Sexuality of persons that have intellectual disabilities has always been rather feared and often misunderstood. Those with disabilities have the identical sexual desires and needs as well as as everyone else. To provide resources and information for teachers giving sexual education to youth with intellectual or physical disabilities is ultimately important. Thus, appropriate sex education for both publicity and people with intellectual deviations should be developed and conducted.
Usually individuals with mental retardation, cerebral palsy, autism spectrum disorder, various genetic and chromosomal disorders including Down syndrome and Fragile X syndrome, and fetal alcohol syndrome are described as having developmental disabilities. However, they have rather stable and fast sexual development which means that individuals with intellectual disability have the same sexual requirements as those without disabilities. 60-90% of people with mild disabilities report looking forward to marry and have children in the foreseeable future.
Thus, it is a myth according to (Griffiths, 2007) that people who have developmental disabilities really should not be given sex education as it will still only encourage inappropriate behavior, etc. On the contrary, sexuality education for people with ID is particularly important due to the high rates of sexual abuse. Some statistics advise that up to 80% of females who have ID and 50% in men with ID will be sexually abused prior to chronological age of 18. It is crucial that we teach skills which render it unlikely for people with ID to get victimized, plus prone to report it when it does occur.
Though, there is a range of challenges while sexually educate people with ID, they should be overcome in order to reduce the problem of sexual abuse, casual sexual relations and mistreatment to the minimum. For instance, it is usually very important to model and explain social norms. Thus, when we hug a child having ID, because he chore at home but we do not explain why, what for, he will often discover that it is appropriate to hug people without a reason any ti,e any where, etc. The same is with sexual behavior. There were repeated occasions of random mating between the different genders among the children with Down syndrome in the history of problem research. Every person having an ID learns differently. That is why when teaching sexual health, it is optimal to teach the same thing in another way, rather than using just one approach and teaching more slowly, etc.
Teaching people with ID\DD is essential in order to increase the risk for sexually transmitted infections and HIV infection, decrease incidence of sexual abuse against people with intellectual disability, interest that people with developmental disability have expressed in learning more about sexuality. It is vital to organize appropriate sex education among the individuals who have developmental disabilities are sexual beings with gaps in knowledge and experience in order to reduce negative attitudes toward sex, and cut unmet needs in the sexual relational aspects of their own lives. In addition, education in relation to the sex issues can prevent them from …