”Hit men inte längre” Erfarenheter och kunskap om att bemöta ungdomars sexualitet på HVB-hem

Sammanfattning: The purpose of this study was to examine how staff at residential care homes for youths reason about issues relating to sexuality and sexual relations of the youths. The purpose was also to examine how staff perceive the availability, or lack thereof, of relevant educational resources and guidelines in this area, such as action plans, brochures, further training about sexuality during employment, and so forth. The empirical data derives from qualitative semi-structured interviews with five staff members working for three different residential homes. The analysis of the data was guided by two theoretical concepts: “accounts” (Scott & Lyman 1968) and “sexual scripts” (Simon & Gagnon 1984). The results partly confirmed that staff at residential care homes for youths perceive a lack of education regarding sexuality, both before and during the employment. The data also indicates that the staff felt that they were expected to already have sufficient knowledge in this area (without any pre-existing education) – this was referred to as “common sense”. The staff also talked about the importance of bringing up the topic of sexuality in a “natural way”. The respondents all said that further education would be helpful with the treatment of the youths, and several factors that could affect the work emerged, which were thought to be easier to deal with if the right education was given. These factors were; the personal interest in the topic sexuality of each individual staff member and their superiors, the difference in personality amongst the youths, the gender of the staff and the youths, wherever the youths were sexually active or not and what kind of sexual scripts the youths and the staff had. The notion of what is correct and positive sexual behaviour could sometimes differ between the staff and the youths, with examples such as what kind of relationships are suitable, which boundaries are appropriate with whom and how accepting of identity differences one should be.