Socio-cultural and religious factors shaping parental perceptions of comprehensive sexuality education in secondary schools: a qualitative study in Oyugis Town, Homa Bay County, Kenya

¹Department of Community Health, School of Public Health, Amref International University, Nairobi, Kenya

^&Corresponding author
Kerryn Awuor Magak, Department of Community Health, School of Public Health, Amref International University, P.O. Box 27691-00506, Nairobi, Kenya

Introduction    

Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) is widely recognized as one of the most effective evidence-based strategies for improving adolescent sexual and reproductive health (SRH) outcomes. UNESCO defines CSE as a structured, curriculum-based process that equips learners with the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values necessary for informed choices about sexuality and interpersonal relationships [1]. When properly implemented, CSE programs have demonstrated capacity to delay sexual debut, increase contraceptive use, and reduce the incidence of sexually transmitted infections [2].

Despite its proven efficacy, CSE implementation across sub-Saharan Africa and Kenya in particular remains inconsistent and frequently contested. Cultural norms, religious convictions, and parental attitudes collectively shape how sexuality education is accepted and delivered at the school level [3]. In communities where open discussion of sexuality carries social stigma, parental resistance can constitute a decisive obstacle to effective program delivery [4]. Homa Bay County presents a strong rationale for urgent CSE investment in Kenya. Approximately 33% of girls between the ages of 15 and 19 have already begun childbearing, a figure that stands in stark contrast to the national average of 15% [5]. Compounding this already serious reproductive health situation is an HIV prevalence rate of 15.2% within the county, which is considerably higher than the national average of 3.7%, with approximately 11,965 adolescents aged 10-19 years living with HIV in the county alone [6]. Taken together, these figures point to the scale of adolescent SRH vulnerability in this setting and the need to identify what inhibits effective CSE delivery.

Oyugis Town, the administrative hub of Rachuonyo South Sub-County within Homa Bay County, offers a relevant research site. As an urbanizing commercial centre with a mixed population, culturally grounded in Luo traditions yet increasingly exposed to formal education, media, and diverse information environments, it represents a context in which the interplay between tradition and modernity is actively reshaping how parents think about sexuality education. Prior research has focused predominantly on rural Kenyan settings or broad national trends, leaving a gap in understanding how parents view and influence CSE delivery in urbanizing communities like Oyugis Town [7]. Parental perceptions of CSE are not formed in isolation; rather, they are socially constructed through the intersection of cultural, moral, and religious frameworks [8]. Understanding this dynamic is essential for designing context-appropriate CSE strategies that are both acceptable to communities and effective in improving adolescent SRH outcomes [9].

This study is grounded in Bronfenbrenner's Ecological Systems Theory, which situates individual attitudes within nested layers of social influence, from the immediate family environment through community and institutional networks to the broader cultural and societal context [10]. This framework is particularly well-suited to examining how macro-level factors such as cultural norms and religious beliefs filter through community and family interactions to shape individual parental responses to CSE. This paper reports findings from the second specific objective of a larger qualitative study: to explore how socio-cultural and religious factors shape parents' perceptions of the provision of CSE in secondary schools in Oyugis Town, Homa Bay County, Kenya.

Methods     

Study design and setting: the study adopts a cross-sectional qualitative research design as its guiding methodological approach to explore how parents perceive the provision of CSE in secondary schools within Oyugis Town, Homa Bay County. A qualitative approach was deemed most appropriate because it provides space for in-depth exploration of parents' beliefs, attitudes, lived experiences, and the meanings they attach to sexuality education within their specific sociocultural contexts [11]. The study was conducted in Oyugis Town, Rachuonyo South Sub-County, a growing commercial and administrative centre characterized by strong Luo cultural traditions, a predominantly Christian population with a Muslim minority, and higher average educational attainment relative to surrounding rural communities. Data were collected between March 2026 and April 2026.

Participants and sampling: a maximum variation purposive sampling strategy was adopted to select information-rich participants capable of offering nuanced insights into parental perceptions of CSE [11]. Parents and guardians were eligible for inclusion if they had at least one child currently enrolled in a public or private secondary school in Oyugis Town and were willing to provide written informed consent; teachers were eligible if they were involved in delivering CSE-related content within secondary schools in the study area; and religious and cultural leaders were eligible if they held a recognized position of authority within the local faith or cultural community. Individuals who did not meet these criteria, or who were unwilling or unable to provide informed consent, were excluded. The study enrolled 28 participants across four groups: 20 parents or guardians of students currently enrolled in selected secondary schools, four secondary school teachers, and four religious and cultural leaders. Parents were recruited through designated school focal persons following approval from relevant authorities and school administrations. Participant diversity was deliberately maximized across gender, age group, educational level, religious affiliation, and economic background to capture the breadth of perspectives present in the community. The data collection process was guided by the principle of thematic saturation, meaning that interviews and discussions were conducted on a continuing basis until no substantially new themes were emerging from the data [12].

Data collection: to generate data that was both detailed and contextually grounded, the study drew on a combination of three complementary semi-structured qualitative methods [13], each developed as a semi-structured guide and pre-tested before fieldwork. The content validity of the interview guides was confirmed through expert review by two public health specialists at Amref International University, who assessed the guides against the study objectives. All interviews and focus group discussions were conducted by the principal investigator together with two research assistants, whom the principal investigator trained before fieldwork on interview technique, probing, and research ethics. Sessions were conducted primarily in Kiswahili and English, with occasional use of Dholuo by individual participants; the research assistants, who were fluent in all three languages, supported translation and verbatim transcription of the audio-recorded sessions.

Two Focus Group Discussions (FGDs), each comprising seven parents, explored shared community beliefs, group dynamics, and collective reasoning about CSE. Six In-depth Individual Interviews (IDIs) with parents allowed for exploration of individual perceptions in greater depth and privacy. Eight Key Informant Interviews (KIIs) were conducted, comprising four secondary school teachers and four religious and cultural leaders, to obtain institutional and community-level perspectives on CSE delivery and parental attitudes. All sessions were conducted face-to-face and audio-recorded with participants' informed consent, then transcribed verbatim. By drawing on multiple qualitative data sources in an integrated manner, the study was able to enhance both the depth and breadth of its analytical insights, while enabling triangulation across different participant groups as a means of strengthening credibility.

Data analysis: thematic analysis was conducted using an inductive approach, allowing themes to emerge organically from the data rather than being imposed from a predetermined framework [14]. Transcripts were reviewed in conjunction with field notes, and initial codes were generated through repeated close reading. Codes were progressively grouped into broader themes representing patterns, similarities, and contrasts across participants' accounts. NVivo 12 software was used to support data management, coding, and retrieval throughout the analytical process. Verbatim quotations are presented throughout to ground findings in participants' own language and frames of reference. This study was reported in accordance with the Consolidated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research (COREQ).

Trustworthiness and reflexivity: as a qualitative study, methodological quality was assessed against criteria of trustworthiness rather than the conventional quantitative benchmarks of validity and reliability, following the four-dimensional framework of Lincoln and Guba (1985): credibility, transferability, dependability, and confirmability, supplemented by attention to researcher reflexivity. Credibility was strengthened through triangulation across three data collection methods and four participant groups, rapport-building before data collection, verbatim transcription, and the use of illustrative direct quotations, in addition to the expert review of interview guides described above. Transferability was supported through thick description of the study context and sampling approach, enabling readers to judge the applicability of findings to comparable urbanizing community settings. Dependability was enhanced through a documented audit trail of methodological decisions and the use of standardized, pre-tested interview guides. Confirmability was promoted through the inductive analytical approach and the grounding of themes in participant quotations.

The researcher remained reflexively aware that her own background and personal experiences could influence the generation and interpretation of data. Given the sensitivity and gendered nature of the subject matter, she recognized the potential for her presence to shape participant disclosure, particularly in mixed-gender focus group discussions and in interviews with male participants and religious leaders. To mitigate this, she adopted a non-judgemental stance, continually emphasized that all perspectives were valued, assured participants of confidentiality, and maintained personal notes throughout data collection and analysis to surface and interrogate her own assumptions.

Ethical considerations: ethical approval was obtained from the Amref International University Ethics and Scientific Review Committee. A research permit (License No. NACOSTI/P/26/4188527) was secured from the National Commission for Science, Technology, and Innovation in compliance with the Science, Technology, and Innovation Act of 2013. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki. Written informed consent was obtained from all participants before any component of the data collection process. Participants were assured of confidentiality, voluntary participation, and their right to withdraw at any point and for any reason without facing any form of penalty or negative consequence. In the case of Focus Group Discussions, deliberate attention was paid to maintaining collective confidentiality among group members as well as respectful engagement throughout each session.

Results     

Socio-demographic profile of participants

A total of 28 participants were enrolled. Among the 20 parents or guardians, 14 were female, and six were male. The majority (n = 14) were aged 35-50 years. Most parents had attained secondary-level education (n = 12), with four having only primary-level education and four having tertiary or vocational training. Seventeen parents identified as Christian and three as Muslim. The majority (n = 15) were engaged in small-scale trade, farming, or informal work. Table 1 presents the full socio-demographic profile of all study participants.

The diminishing but present role of cultural norms

One of the more nuanced findings of this study was that while cultural norms did play a role in shaping parental perceptions of CSE, their influence was considerably less pronounced than prior literature from rural Kenyan settings might have predicted. Oyugis Town's growing status as a commercial and administrative hub had created a social environment characterized by greater exposure to diverse ideas, higher levels of formal education, and more frequent interaction with government health services and media. As a result, the most rigid cultural prohibitions around discussing sexuality openly, while still known to participants, were not uniformly enforced in the ways they might have been in a previous generation or in a purely rural community. Several participants explicitly acknowledged this generational and geographical shift. A parent in FGD 1 observed: the way things are now in Oyugis, it is different from the village. We are exposed to so many things. People here are educated, they watch television, they use the internet. Our children are also exposed. So completely refusing to talk to them about these things is no longer realistic for most of us, (father, FGD 1, age 46, small-scale businessman). A teacher corroborated this observation, noting that parents in Oyugis Town tended to be more receptive to CSE than their counterparts in the more rural parts of Rachuonyo South Sub-County, attributing this partly to urbanization, higher education levels, and greater economic activity in the town.

That said, cultural norms were not absent from the discussion. Older participants and those with stronger ties to rural traditions continued to reference cultural custodians of sexual knowledge, such as aunts and elders, as the appropriate channels for such conversations. The concern was less about prohibiting knowledge entirely and more about the appropriate setting, messenger, and framing of that knowledge. As one elder participant in FGD 2 put it: we do not say young people should know nothing. We say there is a right way and a right person for these conversations. School is not always the right place, and the teacher is not always the right person, (father, FGD 2, age 61, retired civil servant). These findings suggest that cultural influence on parental perceptions of CSE in Oyugis Town was present but evolving, shaped by the town's social context in ways that made blanket resistance less common than in the prior generation, even as preferences for culturally grounded delivery of CSE content remained. With relation to Bronfenbrenner's ecological theory, this pattern points to a macrosystem in transition: exosystem-level exposure to formal education, mass media, and government health services was gradually loosening the hold of traditional cultural prescriptions on what parents considered acceptable within the family.

Religious beliefs and their role in shaping perceptions

Religion emerged as the determinant most consistently cited across the data, operating more consistently than cultural norms in this urban context. Given the dominance of Christianity and, to a lesser extent, Islam in Oyugis Town, participants drew heavily on religious teachings to articulate their positions on CSE, both in support and in opposition. Among parents, religious objections were the most frequently cited basis for resistance. These objections centred on several key concerns: that CSE promoted premarital sexual activity by providing information that, in the view of these parents, would normalize or facilitate it; that any discussion of sexual orientation or gender diversity was fundamentally incompatible with the moral teachings of their faith traditions; and that detailed discussion of contraception was at odds with religious teachings on abstinence and marital fidelity. A pastor who participated as a key informant articulated the religious concern directly: the Bible is clear. Sexual relations are for marriage. When we teach children in school about some of these things like family planning, we are sending them a message that sex before marriage is okay. It is not, (religious leader, KII 4, age 55, pastor/community leader).

Religious leaders were identified across participant groups as influential gatekeepers of community attitudes toward CSE. Teachers noted that when prominent religious figures publicly characterized CSE negatively, the impact on parental willingness to support it at the school level was substantial. However, a minority of participants, primarily those who had received some form of reproductive health training or who had been exposed to faith-based CSE advocacy materials, drew a different set of conclusions from their religious beliefs. These participants argued that protecting adolescents from disease and exploitation was itself a moral imperative grounded in their faith: God gave us wisdom to protect our children. Teaching them to protect themselves from disease and from people who would take advantage of them, that is not against my faith. That is my faith in action, (mother, IDI 6, age 37, small-scale trader). This pointed to the existence of a faith-compatible pathway to CSE acceptance, one that reframed adolescent protection as being aligned with rather than in opposition to core religious values, and which represented a significant strategic opportunity for CSE advocacy in this context. Religious belief operated principally as a macrosystem-level influence, transmitted into individual households through the exosystem role of religious leaders and congregations, whose public positioning on CSE shaped what parents considered acceptable to discuss with their children even though most parents had no direct involvement in that positioning.

Parental position on contraception within CSE

A consistent finding that cut across religious and cultural lines was a widespread parental reluctance to endorse contraception as a component of CSE. Unlike knowledge about sexually transmitted infections, puberty, or the importance of delaying sexual debut, the inclusion of contraceptive information was viewed as a step too far. This position was rooted in the belief that teaching adolescents about contraception effectively communicated societal permission for premarital sexual activity. Participants feared that rather than protecting young people, contraceptive education would remove a key deterrent to early sexual activity. As one mother in FGD 1 stated: if I tell my girl that there are ways to have sex safely, I am telling her it is acceptable to have sex. That is not the message I want to send. We want them to wait until they are married, (mother, FGD 1, age 40, fishmonger). A father in FGD 2 echoed this concern more forcefully: contraceptives have no place in a school. That is for married adults. Teaching it to teenagers is irresponsible and goes against what we believe as Christians, (father, FGD 2, age 48, farmer). Even among parents who acknowledged the public health arguments for contraceptive knowledge, particularly in a context of high HIV prevalence, there was a marked preference for focusing CSE on abstinence, self-worth, and the consequences of early sexual activity rather than on methods of contraception. Teachers noted this as a consistent and strongly held community position that needed to be navigated carefully in any strategy for CSE expansion. This reluctance illustrates how a macrosystem-level moral framework around premarital sex was enacted at the microsystem level of individual parent-child relationships, regardless of a parent's broader support for CSE.

Gender dynamics in parental perceptions

Gender dynamics intersected with religious and cultural factors in significant ways, shaping not only the content of parental perceptions but also the processes through which those perceptions were formed and expressed. Mothers and fathers tended to hold somewhat different views on CSE, with mothers more likely to express conditional support, particularly around topics related to protection from disease and sexual abuse, while fathers were more likely to articulate categorical opposition grounded in concerns about cultural propriety and religious authority.

Multiple participants indicated that they felt CSE content was more urgently needed for girls than for boys, reflecting deeply entrenched gender assumptions about female vulnerability and the primary responsibility of girls for managing sexual risk. A father in FGD 2 expressed this gendered framing explicitly: for girls, yes, maybe some of this education is needed because they are vulnerable. But boys, boys already know these things from their peers. It is different for boys, (father, FGD 2, age 45, fisherman). A mother in FGD 1 challenged this gendered framing directly, arguing that boys needed equal attention: we keep saying girls need protection, girls need education. But who is getting girls pregnant? It is also boys. We need to teach boys about respect and responsibility. That is gender education too, (mother, FGD 1, age 40, fishmonger). These contrasting positions highlight how gender norms operated not only as a determinant of parental perceptions but also as a site of internal community debate about the purpose and scope of CSE, with implications for how gender-responsive approaches should be framed in this context. These patterns reflect the interaction of microsystem family practice with macrosystem gender norms, with mothers and fathers each enacting broader societal expectations about female vulnerability and male responsibility within their own households.

The role of media and misinformation

Participants across multiple groups identified the media, encompassing local radio broadcasts, social media platforms, and community word-of-mouth, as a significant driver of misinformation about CSE in Oyugis Town. Several parents indicated that their negative perceptions of CSE had been reinforced or initially triggered by radio discussions or community conversations in which CSE was characterized as a foreign or Western imposition or a program designed to corrupt children. A mother who participated in IDI 2 described her initial encounter with CSE-related information: I first heard about sex education on a local radio station. The people discussing it were saying it teaches children to have sex and to become homosexuals. I was very alarmed. It was only later, when the school held a meeting, that I understood its importance, (mother, IDI 2, age 29, small-scale trader).

Another participant in FGD 2 described how misinformation spread through community messaging platforms shaped his initial reaction to CSE: someone shared a message in our church WhatsApp group saying that sex education was teaching children to be homosexuals. I believed it. Many of us believed it. It was only much later that we found out the message was completely false, (father, FGD 2, age 48, farmer). This finding underscored the extent to which the communication environment surrounding CSE played a significant role in shaping parental perceptions, particularly in a rapidly digitalizing context like Oyugis Town. Teachers and the education official noted that misinformation spread rapidly and was difficult to counter, particularly when it was endorsed by respected community or religious figures. In ecological terms, digital and broadcast media functioned as an exosystem: a setting in which parents did not directly participate but which nonetheless shaped the information reaching their households and, through it, their attitudes toward CSE.

Discussion     

Statement of principal findings

This study found that religion was the determinant most consistently associated with parental perceptions of CSE in Oyugis Town, operating more consistently than cultural norms in this increasingly urbanized context. The macrosystem of Oyugis Town was characterised by a negotiated rather than a uniformly traditional cultural orientation toward sexuality education, a finding that departs meaningfully from what prior literature from rural Kenyan and sub-Saharan African settings might have predicted. Religious leaders functioned as influential gatekeepers of community attitudes, parental resistance to contraceptive content within CSE was pervasive and cross-cutting, gender dynamics reinforced differential expectations for daughters versus sons, and digital misinformation emerged as a significant and underrecognized dimension of the CSE implementation challenge in this context.

Interpreting findings through bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory

Taken together, the five findings map onto distinct, interacting levels of Bronfenbrenner's ecological model. At the macrosystem level, religious doctrine and, to a lesser extent, Luo cultural tradition influenced how parents evaluated CSE, with religious teaching proving the more durable of the two in this urbanizing setting. This macrosystem did not reach individual households directly: it was mediated by an exosystem in which parents themselves had little direct participation, comprising religious leaders' public statements, radio broadcasts, and social media platforms, all of which filtered and, at times, distorted the CSE message before it reached families.

The mesosystem was most visible where school and family intersected. School-organized information sessions repeatedly appeared in participants' accounts as the point at which exosystem misinformation was corrected and macrosystem objections were renegotiated, as in the case of the IDI 2 mother who moved from alarm to support after a school meeting. Finally, at the microsystem level, these upstream influences were enacted in the day-to-day judgments parents made within their own households, including the widely shared decision to withhold contraceptive information regardless of a parent's general stance on CSE.

Viewing the findings this way clarifies why cultural norms proved less determinative than religion in this context. Urbanization affected the exosystem through greater exposure to formal education, government health services, and diverse media. In doing so, it weakened the macrosystem's cultural strand while leaving its religious strand comparatively intact. It also clarifies why school-based engagement emerged as a promising intervention point: because the mesosystem is where exosystem distortion and macrosystem objection are most open to renegotiation, interventions positioned at the school-family interface are better placed to shift parental attitudes than efforts aimed at the macrosystem or microsystem alone.

Strengths and weaknesses of the study

The study's principal strength lies in its contextual specificity. By focusing on an urbanizing community in Homa Bay County, this study generates localized evidence that moves beyond generalizations from rural or national-level research and addresses a gap that the existing literature has left insufficiently examined. Triangulation across three qualitative methods and four participant groups strengthened the credibility of findings, while the use of verbatim quotations throughout ensures that the analysis remains grounded in participants' own language and frames of reference. Limitations include the inherent risk of social desirability bias in self-reported responses on a culturally sensitive topic, mitigated through confidentiality assurances and careful rapport-building prior to and during data collection. The sensitivity of the subject matter may have caused some parents to decline participation or to provide more guarded responses, potentially introducing an element of selection bias. As a qualitative, purposively sampled study, findings are not statistically generalizable, though they offer analytical transferability to comparable urbanizing community contexts. Resource constraints inherent in a single-investigator master's-level study limited sample size and scope, though thematic saturation was achieved within those boundaries.

Strengths and weaknesses in relation to other studies

The finding that religion rather than cultural norms constituted the primary determinant of parental perceptions in Oyugis Town is consistent with the broader literature on sexuality education in highly religious communities across sub-Saharan Africa. Bweyale and Sekaye's (2023) Ugandan study found that parents' support for CSE was frequently conditioned on its alignment with religious values, with respondents insisting that sexuality education must be premised within the framework of religious teachings [15]. Parker (2020) similarly documents that in highly religious communities, CSE was routinely evaluated through a moral rather than a public health lens [16].

The relatively diminishing role of cultural norms in Oyugis Town is a departure from findings in more rural settings, where cultural custodianship systems were reported as dominant and largely intact [17,18]. This finding aligns with Parker's (2020) observation that in more urbanized and economically active communities, the influence of traditional custodianship systems on sexual socialization was increasingly in competition with modern media, formal education, and peer networks [16]. The cross-cutting parental resistance to contraceptive content resonates with Boonstra's (2011) documentation of the preference for abstinence-focused education in highly religious communities [19] and with Ocran's (2024) finding that parents in Homa Bay County supported CSE conditionally, insisting that it be grounded in religious teachings [20]. The rapid spread of misinformation through digital platforms as documented in the present study, represents an emerging and under-researched dimension of the CSE communication challenge noted by Parker (2020) [16].

Discussion of important differences in results

A notable finding was the internal diversity within the parental group regarding the relationship between faith and CSE. While the majority drew on religious teachings to resist aspects of CSE, a meaningful minority reframed adolescent protection as a religious obligation, arguing that faith demanded engagement with rather than avoidance of SRH realities. This internal heterogeneity, not captured in prior studies that characterize religious communities as uniformly opposed to CSE, points to a strategic opportunity. Identifying and amplifying faith-compatible framings of CSE within the community itself, rather than positioning faith and CSE as categorically opposed. Similarly, the active counter-narratives offered by some female participants regarding gendered double standards in CSE expectations highlight that communities are not monolithic and that gender-progressive voices already exist within the parental body. Recognizing and actively engaging these voices in program design and community advocacy efforts could meaningfully advance more equitable CSE delivery in this context.

Meaning of the study

The finding that religious leaders functioned as influential gatekeepers of community attitudes toward CSE in Oyugis Town points to a strategic opportunity, and an important priority, for deliberate engagement with religious institutions in CSE advocacy efforts. The evidence from UNFPA (2019) on faith-based CSE engagement offers a relevant precedent: where religious leaders had been sensitized to the public health and developmental rationale for CSE and had come to see it as consonant with their pastoral responsibilities, their endorsement produced measurable shifts in community acceptance [21]. The most promising pathway, as suggested both by the literature and by the present findings, is one of authentic dialogue that invites religious leaders into a substantive conversation about the SRH realities facing adolescents in their communities, exploring how faith traditions can be drawn upon to support rather than obstruct adolescent protection.

The consistent and cross-cutting parental reluctance to endorse contraception as a component of CSE suggests that a rigid insistence on comprehensive contraceptive content may constitute a significant barrier to the community acceptance that is essential for effective CSE delivery. A pragmatic approach might involve phased engagement, beginning with topics that enjoy broader parental support, such as puberty education, self-protection from disease, and life skills, while pursuing longer-term community dialogue to address the deeper concerns about contraception in a manner that respects community values. The digital misinformation finding points to the urgency of proactive and systematic community-level communication strategies around CSE. School-based information sessions, as described by participants who subsequently revised negative initial perceptions, represent an accessible entry point for such strategies, and suggest that direct engagement between schools and parents can meaningfully shift attitudes when pursued deliberately and consistently.

Unanswered questions and future research

Several important questions remain for future investigation. Longitudinal research tracking how parental perceptions evolve following structured faith-based engagement or school-based information sessions would contribute valuable evidence on what interventions are most effective at shifting attitudes over time. Research that directly compares parental perceptions across rural, peri-urban, and urban settings within the same county would help clarify how urbanization mediates the relative influence of cultural and religious factors on CSE acceptance. Additionally, targeted empirical evidence exploring the perspectives of adolescents themselves on how parental attitudes affect their engagement with CSE content would provide a critical complement to this parent-centred analysis and would help inform a more complete understanding of the factors shaping CSE outcomes in Oyugis Town.

Conclusion     

Religion is the primary determinant of parental perceptions of CSE in Oyugis Town, operating in a more consistent and robust manner than cultural norms in this urbanizing context. The town's social environment, shaped by urbanization, higher educational attainment, and greater exposure to diverse information sources, has eroded some of the most rigid cultural prohibitions, but religious convictions remain deeply embedded and constitute the most significant barrier to CSE acceptance. Religious leaders function as community gatekeepers whose positioning on CSE constitutes a significant influence on collective parental attitudes, and deliberate faith-based engagement is therefore an important rather than an optional component of any CSE advocacy strategy in this context. Parental resistance to contraceptive content is pervasive and requires phased, community-sensitive programming approaches. Gender dynamics reinforce differential expectations that reflect and reproduce broader social inequalities. Therefore, gender-responsive approaches are essential. Digital misinformation represents an emerging and significant challenge that requires proactive and sustained community communication strategies. Addressing these interconnected factors will be essential for strengthening parental support and improving the quality of CSE provision in secondary schools in Oyugis Town and in comparable urbanizing communities across Kenya.

Competing interests     

The authors declare no competing interests.

Authors' contributions     

Kerryn Awuor Magak: conceptualization, methodology, investigation, formal analysis, writing-original draft, writing-review and editing. Tom Marwa: conceptualization, supervision, writing-review and editing. Dickens Onyango: supervision, validation, writing-review and editing. All authors have read and approved the final version of this manuscript.

Acknowledgments     

The author extends sincere gratitude to all study participants, including parents, teachers, education officials, and religious and cultural leaders in Oyugis Town, whose generous engagement and willingness to share their perspectives made this work possible.

Table     

Table 1: socio-demographic profile of study participants (parents/guardians, teachers, and religious/cultural leaders), recruited across secondary schools and community institutions in Oyugis Town, Rachuonyo South Sub-County, Homa Bay County, Kenya, from March 2026 to April 2026 (N = 28)

References