Besides having actual physical encounters together, preadolescent peers of the same sex often serve directly as sex educators for each other. Conn (1948) found this peer sex education can be direct educa tion through word or deed or it can be carried on indirectly through the medium of the "dirty joke." When I was in third grade, a girl who was a year older than I told me point-blank that babies were conceived when the penis was inserted in the vagina. Biz informed our playground jump rope group that a girl can get pregnant "when a boy sticks his thing inside of you." Just before puberty the subculture of boys my age began to move into the stage of dirty jokes and suggestive ideas. This demonstrated a hunger for knowledge which I also wished for. While still very young I was introduced to masturbation by another boy.... I didn't enjoy it, nor did I get any sensation out of it at first, but on his instructions to keep at it, I did achieve an orgasm without ejaculation. Our school bus was an educational unit in itself. It seems as if every crude story and joke hit it once if not twice.
One day a friend who was about a year older than
myself and I were sitting at a soda fountain
having a coke. My friend quietly mentioned,
"Look at those boxes of sanitary napkins." I had
heard of Kotex but I had never heard of the term
sanitary napkin. After leaving I asked this boy
about the sanitary napkins. This fellow not only
answered my questions but in doing so he gave me
a very complete explanation of the facts of life
for a boy of only twelve. Where he received this
information I did not ask but I'm sure it must
have been from very responsible parents. I say
this because he gave it in a very understanding
and wholesome attitude.
Sexual Encounters With Older Youth
The learning situation in sex is commonly initiated by someone
older in age and more experienced than the learner. Most commonly these
encounters are single encounters rather than continuing relations between
a preadolescent and an older person. Kinsey (1948, p. 173) found
that the boy from the lower socio-economic classes has considerable information
and "help" on sex matters from older boys, or from adult
males, and in many cases his first heterosexual contacts are with older
girls who already have had experience.
Rainwater (1970), writing about preadolescents in the Pruitt-Igo
area of St. Louis-black families in a federal slum-indicates that interest
in the grown-up world is greatly heightened in the preadolescent
period. These preadolescents perhaps observe more adolescent
sexual activity than adult sexual activity because adolescent sexual
activity often takes place outside, "in hallways, stairwells, galleries,
laundry rooms, and on the project grounds." Adults in Pruitt-Igo
think of preadolescence as a period of intense imitation of adults, unlike
middle-class adults who are more likely to think of their children
as innocent of such knowledge and activity.
Children are often present during conversations about sexual behavior,
a favorite topic of conversation among both adolescents and
adults. They learn the words, concepts, implications, and meaning of
sexual terms and can appear to be remarkably sophisticated even though
they have not had exposure to sexual behavior directly. One of the ways
their sexual knowledge develops is through learning to "joan," that is,
to master traditional stories or "toasts" of black folklore. Actual observation
of sexual activity makes it possible for many preadolescents
to tell stories about such events.
By preadolescence children of Pruitt-Igo not only know "how to do
it" but they also know that sexual activity is regarded as desirable.
According to Rainwater, they move early and easily from listening to
sex conversation and from passive observation to active participation.
Not that they move directly to sexual intercourse; their relationships
are primarily social and are modeled after the "going steady" pattern
of youth. Play activity often eventuates in playing at sexual intercourse
which may or may not involve actual penetration.
The girls are ambivalent about playing sex with a boy; however,
"they are committed anticipatorily to the roles as sexual partners as
part of their developing conception of themselves as women." (Rainwater,
1970, p. 280). Involvement of preadolescents with persons of other age categories
can take a variety of forms. The following cases involve homosexual encounters,
looking at sex pictures and exposing, masturbating, dating,
fondling, fellating, and engaging in intercourse and sodomy. Perhaps
the most common contact of preadolescents, especially among the middle-
class, with those of other ages involves "sex education," that is, verbal
sex instruction.