Fewer teens are getting pregnant, but it's not because they're having less sex

From 2007 to 2013, births to teens age 15 to 19 dropped by 36 percent; pregnancies fell by 25 percent from 2007 to 2011, according to federal data (PDF).

But that wasn’t because teens were shunning sex. The amount of sex being had by teenagers during that time period was largely unchanged, says the study (PDF), which was published online in the Journal of Adolescent Health. And it wasn’t because they were having more abortions. Abortion has been declining among all age groups, and particularly among teenagers.

Rather, the researchers from the Guttmacher Institute and Columbia University found that “improvement in contraceptive use” accounted for the entire reduced risk of pregnancy over the five-year period.