Editing Purity test (section)

==Historical examples==
The ''[[Rice Thresher]]'' student newspaper in 1924 published the results of an informal ten-question survey of 119 female undergraduate students at [[Rice University]], with questions like "Have you ever been drunk?", "Did you ever dance conspicuously?", and "Have you ever done anything that you wouldn't tell your mother?"<ref>{{cite news |title=Rice Girls Not Quite Half Bad |work=The Thresher |volume=9 |issue=22 |page=1 |date=1924-03-07 |location=Houston |url=https://digitalcollections.rice.edu/Documents/Detail/the-thresher-houston-tex.-vol.-9-no.-22-ed.-1-friday-march-7-1924/16589 |access-date=2024-08-23}}</ref> The test has periodically been revisited and revised by the Thresher, usually on its satirical "Backpage," with expanded lists of questions that students can take and score on their own, starting with a list of 100 questions in 1988.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Abdow |first1=Emily |title=Purity Test evolves, spreads beyond Rice |url=https://www.ricethresher.org/article/2017/08/purity-test-evolves-spreads-beyond-rice |access-date=2024-08-23 |work=The Rice Thresher |date=2017-08-23}}</ref> The newspaper's staff have held conflicting opinions on the test, but continue to publish it most years.<ref>{{cite news |last1=Lauriello |first1=Anthony |title=Release of new purity test long overdue |url=https://www.ricethresher.org/article/2012/08/release-of-new-purity-test-long-overdue |accessdate=2025-04-13 |work=The Rice Thresher |date=2012-08-17}}</ref>

The [[Columbia University]] humor magazine, ''[[Jester of Columbia|The Jester]]'', reported in its October 1935 issue on a campus wide "purity test" conducted at [[Barnard College]] in 1935. The issue of ''The Jester'' was briefly censored, with distribution curtailed until the director of activities at the university could review the article. According to the editor-in-chief of ''The Jester'', "We printed the survey to clear up some of the misconceptions that Columbia and the outside world have about Barnard girls," he said. "The results seem to establish that Barnard girls are quite regular. I fail to see anything off-color in the story. It's a sociological study."<ref name="columbia">{{cite news |url=http://spectatorarchive.library.columbia.edu/cgi-bin/columbia?a=d&d=cs19351023-01.2.5&e=-------en-20--1--txt-txIN------# |title=New Jester Issue is Censored for 45 Minutes by Hubbard |last=Friedman |first=Daniel M. |work=Columbia Spectator |date=1935-10-23 |page=1 |access-date=2015-09-08}}</ref>

In 1936, ''[[The Indian Express]]'' reported that students at Toronto University were "under-going a 'purity test', which took "the form of twenty very personal questions, designed to determine the state of their morals and their 'purity ratio'. For example, so many marks are lost for smoking, drinking, and every time the sinner kisses a girl or boy. Then, after truthfully answering all the questions, the total number of bad marks are added up and subtracted from a hundred. What is left, if any, is the 'purity ratio'. The test is unofficial and just what it will prove when completed nobody knows."<ref>{{cite news |title=Students Undergo a 'Purity Test' |agency=Indian Allied News |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=0L8-AAAAIBAJ&sjid=XkwMAAAAIBAJ&pg=6237,1895843&dq=purity-test&hl=en |newspaper=[[The Indian Express]] |location=Madras |date=1936-02-08 |page=4 |access-date=12 December 2010}}</ref>

[[Alan Dundes]], a professor of anthropology and folklore at the [[University of California, Berkeley]], and Carl R. Pagter included examples of purity tests in their 1975 book ''Work Hard and You Shall Be Rewarded: Urban Folklore from the Paperwork Empire''. They noted, "An indication of the particular sexual activities that are valued is provided by various versions of a questionnaire parody entitled 'Virtue Test' or 'Official Purity Test' or the like. It is obviously doubtful whether anyone would answer the questions posed on the test in an honest and truthful fashion. Nevertheless, the questions themselves serve to reveal a good deal about the American male's sexual fantasy life."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Dundes |first1=Alan |author-link1=Alan Dundes |last2=Pagter |first2=Carl R. |title=Work Hard and You Shall Be Rewarded: Urban Folklore from the Paperwork Empire |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1ALhLiy-hmoC&dq=%22purity+test%22+sex&pg=PA121 |access-date=2010-12-12 |series=American Folklore Society's Memoir Series |volume=62 |year=1992 |orig-year=1975 |publisher=Wayne State University Press |location=Detroit |isbn=978-0-8143-2432-5 |page=120}}</ref> Dundes and Pagter's book reprints a "Virtue Test" circulated at [[Indiana University]] in 1939 and a more contemporary "Official Purity Test" circulated at [[California Institute of Technology]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Dundes |first1=Alan |author-link1=Alan Dundes |last2=Pagter |first2=Carl R. |title=Work Hard and You Shall Be Rewarded: Urban Folklore from the Paperwork Empire |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1ALhLiy-hmoC&dq=%22purity+test%22+sex&pg=PA121 |access-date=2010-12-12 |series=American Folklore Society's Memoir Series |volume=62 |year=1992 |orig-year=1975 |publisher=Wayne State University Press |location=Detroit |isbn=978-0-8143-2432-5 |pages=120–123}}</ref>

In 1976, a teacher at [[La Grange High School]] in Texas was fired for distributing a 1966 purity test, which had appeared in the [[Ask Ann Landers]] column, to her students. The questions on the test ranged from "Ever said 'I love you'?" to "Ever had group sex?"<ref>{{cite news |title=Ask Ann Landers Test Gets Teacher Fired |agency=[[United Press International|UPI]] |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=q_AcAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ymcEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6729,6463810&dq=purity-test+ann-landers&hl=en |newspaper=[[Sarasota Herald-Tribune]] |date=1980-02-29 |page=9-A |access-date=12 December 2010}}</ref> The teacher sued the school district and was awarded $71,000 in back pay and damages.<ref>{{cite news |title=Teacher wins $71,000 in sex test case |agency=[[Associated Press|AP]] |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=DmAtAAAAIBAJ&sjid=H4gFAAAAIBAJ&pg=3213,4291184&dq=purity-test+ann-landers&hl=en |newspaper=[[Tri-City Herald]] |date=1980-10-15 |page=5 |access-date=12 December 2010}}</ref>