Religiosity as a predictor of Redeemer University Undergraduates' sexual behaviour: Does age, gender and family type have roles to play?

Sexual behaviour associated with young people is becoming alarming, and numerous studies have revealed that religion and religiosity have a significant impact on young people's sexual behaviour. However, little research has been done in Nigeria to examine the moderating role of age, gender and family type on religiosity and sexual behaviour. A descriptive research design was adopted, and purposive sampling techniques were adopted to recruit study respondents from Redeemers' University, Ede, Osun State, via e-questionnaires. One thousand and fifty-two (1052) respondents filled the e-questionnaires. Descriptive, moderation and regression analysis were used in making an inference. The result indicated that 54.1% of the respondents had deep religiosity while 45.9% had superficial religiosity. Respondents with deep religiosity (52.9%) were sexually inactive while those with superficial religiosity were sexually active. The regression analysis revealed that religiosity was able to explain 40% variance in young people's sexual behaviour (R²= 0.40, F(1, 1051)=708.87, p<.05). However, the family type (β =- 1.32 SE = 0.32, p> .05) and gender (β =- 1.44 SE = 4.51, p> .05) was unable to play a moderating role between religiosity and sexual behaviour relationship. Age (β =- 6.05 SE = 3.16, p< .05) moderates the role of religiosity on young people’s sexual behaviour. The study concluded that religiosity is a tool capable of addressing negative consequences of young people's sexual behaviour. The study recommends that university management be cognizant of religiosity as a tool to curb such vices while making social policies concerning young people's sexual behaviour.