Desirability of Social Values and Sexual Morality among Nigerian University Undergraduates: Social Studies to the Rescue

Abstract

Many cherished social values among Nigerian societies appear to have been eroded due to some contemporary issues and problems of the society. Hence, youths are now faced with lots of behavioural problems among which is sexual immorality that is seriously affecting their future developmental aspirations This paper therefore examined values and sexual morality among university undergraduates and how Social Studies Educators could restore the lost social values through effective teaching with a view to transforming the sexual immorality that is taking an alarming dimension among university undergraduates in Nigeria in recent times. The research adopted a descriptive research of the survey type and respondents were selected through multi-stage sampling techniques. A simple random technique was used to select three states at stage one, stratified random sampling was used to select two federal, two state and two private universities at stage two, while random sampling through the use of balloting was used to select two universities from each stratum and two hundred and sixty five students from each of the universities at the third stage. The total sample was made up of one thousand, five hundred and eighty one (1581). A self-designed instrument titled ‘Values and Sexual Morality Questionnaire’ (VASMOQ) was used for the study and data collected were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics such as Percentage Scores, Mean, Standard Deviation, Pearson Product Moment Correlation,  Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and t-test. The study found a significant relationship between peer pressure and university undergraduates’ social values, as well as undergraduates’ sexual immorality. The study concluded by suggesting among others that educators should design a programme to introduce new contents that would incorporate relevant knowledge on social values of the society as General Studies (GST) for all university undergraduates.  All hypothesis were tested at 0.05 level of significance.