HOUSTON (The New York Times News Service) --Researchers have found that mothers' views about premarital sex don't affect their decisions on whether their pre-teen or teenage daughters should get the vaccine against the sexually transmitted virus that causes cervical cancer.

The survey, by a team at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, appears to refute the perception that mothers who opt against their daughters receiving the vaccine for the human papillomavirus do so because they oppose sex before marriage.

"This is a decision about parenting, vulnerability and vaccine attitudes, not sexuality," said Susan Rosenthal, a UTMB pediatric psychologist and the study's lead author. "Mothers who haven't had their daughter vaccinated yet most often said they want more time to learn about the vaccine."

The survey, which appears in the September Journal of Adolescent Health, involved about 150 mothers at a UTMB pediatric clinic in 2007. The women were of mixed socioeconomic levels and ethnicity.

The vaccine, Gardasil, was licensed in 2006 for use in girls and women ages 9 to 26. Health officials recommend it for girls ages 11 or 12. It is also offered in "catch-up" vaccination campaigns to teens and women in their 20s.

The vaccine was the subject of heated debate in the 2007 Texas Legislature, after Gov. Rick Perry issued an executive order that would have required schoolgirls to be inoculated with it. Some legislators argued that Texas girls shouldn't be "the study group" for the vaccine.

Others argued it would encourage teenage sexual activity.

UTMB researchers didn't ask whether mothers feared such an effect. They found, however, that mothers who wanted their daughters to remain virgins until marriage were just as likely to have them get the vaccine as those who didn't expect their daughters to wait until marriage to have sex.

Rosenthal said mothers who provided more supervision for their daughters when the girls were with peers -- "reducing opportunity for sex to just happen" -- were more likely to opt for the vaccine.

Perry's order was eventually overturned. Texas lawmakers may not reconsider the issue of whether to require the vaccines for schoolchildren until 2011.

The survey was funded by Merck, the vaccine's manufacturer, and the National Institutes of Health.

Copyright 2008 The New York Times News Service. All rights reserved.