Investigating Teenage Pregnancy in Sierra Leone. Case Study: Portee Community in the East End of Freetown

This study attempts to answer the question related to the causes and effect related to pregnancy on the educational and holistic development of our school going teenage girls and as well as out of school going teenage girls. Firstly, this study endeavors to identify prescription of the respondent on the causes of teenage pregnancy. It also looks at the different perceptions about teenage pregnancy and the way it should be combated. The respondents also agree that parents don’t talk about the consequences of planned or unplanned indulgence of sex. Secondly, this study attempted to find out the causes of teenage pregnancy and its effects on holistic development of our country as perceived by the respondents in terms of community factor. The finding shows that the respondents agreed to all indicators stated in the questionnaire. A self-made questionnaire was employed to gather data of the study, average weighted mean was used to find out the extent of teenage pregnancy among school going teenage girls as well as out of school going teenage girls. T-test was used to test the significant difference of the extent of the educational development when respondent was grouped according age, educational attainment, type of school attended and the socio-economic status of the family. Step-wise regression analysis was used to analyze which among the causes of teenage pregnancy greatly affect the respondent educational development.