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When true love waits: Women’s memorable religious purity scripts from childhood and adolescence
Parker, Lily
Parker, Lily
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t25029_Parker.pdf
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2025-05
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Using a blended theoretical framework of the theory of memorable messages, social identity theory, and sexual script theory, this study used depth interviews with women from Christian backgrounds to explore messages of purity shared within their religious communities. Interviewees’ (n = 13) narratives were coded using iterative thematic analysis. Themes reveal that religious communities are salient sources of sexual scripts. Key findings indicate that purity scripts emphasized the value of modesty and virginity, provided essentialist perspectives on gender, restricted sex to heterosexual and monogamous marriage, and imparted rigid expectations of purity to maintain relationships. From these messages, women reported experiencing self-objectification, sexual shame and anxiety, pain disorders (e.g. dyspareunia, vaginismus), complications in consenting to sex, fear of rejection and abandonment, and complications in their religious identity. This research adds to the literature about how sexual scripts form out of memorable experiences and salient social identities and contributes to understanding the role of a religious identity in the development of the sexual self.
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Thesis (M.A.)-- Wichita State University, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Elliott School of Communication
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Wichita State University
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© Copyright 2025 by Lily Parker
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