Impact of Guidance and Counselling in Curbing Early Pregnancy among Adolescent Female Secondary School Students in Post-Covid Nigeria

Abstract

This paper examined the roles of guidance and counseling in curbing teenage pregnancy among adolescent girl children in Nigeria. The concept of teenagers and adolescents were critically examined. The paper further considered the causes of teenage pregnancy among adolescents’ girls as well as the roles played by guidance counselors in preventing unwanted pregnancies among the teenagers. Some of the strategies highlighted to be used in counseling against teenage pregnancy among adolescent girls include self-control, problem solving skills, dialogue, self-directive behavior, encouraging abstinence, sex education, shaping, and laying out the consequences. It was recommended, among others, that guidance counselors should use different strategies to inculcate in the female secondary school student’s relevant knowledge about dangers of teenage pregnancy and its consequences. The paper concluded that the high incidence of teenage pregnancy can be attributed to wrong orientation, misconception and ignorance which make teenage pregnancy to be at its peak among adolescents. Therefore, all hands must be on deck to avert the dangers and effects of this menace among the female adolescents.