Focus groups and in-depth interviews were used to explore the decline in popularity of the contraceptive implant in a clinic-based sample of 41 ethnically diverse, urban, sexually active adolescents. While these teenagers' socioeconomic status and patterns of inconsistent contraceptive use made them potentially ideal implant recipients, they were unlikely to select this method. Negative media reports about the method were less influential than social conditions such as peer perspectives and gender relations. Oral networks that propagated misinformation went unchallenged because of the silence of satisfied users. Personal factors such as future orientation, autonomous decision-making and value of control also influenced contraceptive decision-making.
(Family Planning Perspectives, 29:167-172, 1997)