The journey home for Thanksgiving won't be quite so far this year for many young adults. Instead of traveling across country or across town, many grown sons and daughters will be coming to dinner from their old bedroom down the hall, which now doubles as their recession-era refuge.

A recent survey by the Pew Research Center finds that 13% of parents with grown children say one of their adult sons or daughters has moved back home in the past year. Social scientists call them "boomerangers" -- young adults who move in with parents after living away from home. This recession has produced a bumper crop.

While the recession has touched Americans of all ages, it has been particularly hard on young adults. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a smaller share of 16- to 24-year-olds are currently employed -- 46.1% -- than at any time since the government began collecting such data in 1948.

At the same time, college enrollment has soared to an all-time high. Taken together, record unemployment and growing college enrollments help explain why proportionately fewer young people today are living by themselves.

Source: Pew Research Center
http://pewsocialtrends.org/pubs/748/recession-brings-many-young-adults-back-to-the-nest#prc-jump

While this new study doesn't show an increase in the percentage of teen girls who have contracted an Sexually Transmitted Disease (see my post from March of 2008 here), there isn't any improvement either. What I found most interesting in this new study is that of the sexually experienced girls studied, 37.7% had developed an STD. And within a year of having a first sexual experience, it was shown that 1 in 5 girls will develop an STD (19.2%).

Putting the morals and values argument aside for a moment, it seems that these STD rates, in and of themselves, make a great case for teen abstinence.

As many as one in four U.S. teenage girls have had a sexually transmitted disease (STD), many infected soon after their first sexual encounter, a new government report shows.

"The high burden of STDs among teen girls reminds us that we can't ignore this," said study author Dr. Sami L. Gottlieb, from the division of sexually transmitted disease prevention at the U.S. Centers for Disease and Prevention.

"Sexual health is an important part of the overall health and well-being of teenagers," Gottlieb added. "For too long, we as a nation have been far too squeamish about sexual health issues for teens, but we owe it to our kids to get over it."

The report is published online Nov. 23 and in the December print issue of the journal Pediatrics.

For the study, Gottlieb's team collected data on 838 teen girls aged 14 to 19. Using samples provided by the teens, the researchers looked for Neisseria gonorrhoeae, Chlamydia trachomatis, Trichomonas vaginalis, herpes simplex virus type 2 and human papillomavirus (HPV).

The study authors found that 24.1 percent of the girls had one of these STDs and among girls who were sexually experienced, 37.7 percent had an STD. HPV was the most common infection (18.3 percent), followed by chlamydia (3.9 percent).

Moreover, in the year after having their first sexual experience and with only one sex partner, 19.2 percent of the teens developed an STD, Gottlieb's group found.

Source: U.S. News & World Report
http://health.usnews.com/articles/health/healthday/2009/11/23/one-in-four-teen-girls-have-stds.html

 1. black friday 2009
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 7. top chef
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10. food network

Source: Bing
http://www.bing.com/xrank/

Top 10 U.S. Websites - 11/20/09

Vampires aside, it's really just a simple love story.

The reason teenage girls have fallen hard for the Twilight book and film series has to do with its portrayal of a traditional, romantic relationship, new research from the University of Missouri shows.

In the series, vampire Edward Cullen doesn't want to harm or bite his teen love interest Bella Swan, which means they can't have sex.

"With teens, we actually found that they appreciated the messages of abstinence," said Melissa Click, an assistant professor of communication who surveyed 4,000 Twilight fans, aged 11 to 70.

Click and her co-authors' research primarily addresses the reasons behind the teenage-madness for Twilight, a four-book series with two films so far.

The Missouri research found that many teen girls — who make up the core of Twilight's audience, along with a few moms — are drawn to the story about love beyond the physical.

"The media environment is saturated with teens in sexual relationships," said Click, who plans to publish the findings next spring in a collaborative book Bitten by Twilight: Youth culture, media and the vampire franchise.

"(Twilight) does provide something different for girls. I've had girls say to me, 'I'm going to wait for my Edward.' And they think that's really cool."

Source: Vancouver Sun
http://www.vancouversun.com/entertainment/Lack+attracts+teen+girls+Twilight+series+study/2238456/story.html