TY - JOUR
T1 - Devaluation of Safe Sex by Delay or Uncertainty
T2 - A Within-Subjects Study of Mechanisms Underlying Sexual Risk Behavior
AU - Wongsomboon, Val
AU - Robles-Sotelo, Elias
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2016, Springer Science+Business Media New York.
PY - 2017/10/1
Y1 - 2017/10/1
N2 - The value of safe sex may be discounted based on contextual factors associated with an opportunity for sex. College students in a within-subjects study selected hypothetical sexual partners from a set of pictures and classified them based on attractiveness and estimated chance of having an sexually transmitted infection (STI). In the Sexual Delay Discounting (SDD) task, participants rated their likelihood (0–100 %) of waiting for some period of time (e.g., 3 h) to have protected sex with their selected partners, when they could have immediate sex without protection. In the Sexual Probability Discounting (SPD) task, participants rated their likelihood of having protected sex if the opportunity was uncertain (e.g., 50 %), when they could have unprotected sex for sure (100 %). All participants included in the final analyses were aware of and had a positive attitude towards protection against STIs as they were likely to have immediate (or certain) protected sex. Results from 432 delay data in the SDD task and 488 probability data in the SPD task showed that participants’ preference for safe sex systematically decreased as the delay to and odds against having safe sex increased. However, this preference was altered by the participants’ perception of their partner’s attractiveness and STI risk.
AB - The value of safe sex may be discounted based on contextual factors associated with an opportunity for sex. College students in a within-subjects study selected hypothetical sexual partners from a set of pictures and classified them based on attractiveness and estimated chance of having an sexually transmitted infection (STI). In the Sexual Delay Discounting (SDD) task, participants rated their likelihood (0–100 %) of waiting for some period of time (e.g., 3 h) to have protected sex with their selected partners, when they could have immediate sex without protection. In the Sexual Probability Discounting (SPD) task, participants rated their likelihood of having protected sex if the opportunity was uncertain (e.g., 50 %), when they could have unprotected sex for sure (100 %). All participants included in the final analyses were aware of and had a positive attitude towards protection against STIs as they were likely to have immediate (or certain) protected sex. Results from 432 delay data in the SDD task and 488 probability data in the SPD task showed that participants’ preference for safe sex systematically decreased as the delay to and odds against having safe sex increased. However, this preference was altered by the participants’ perception of their partner’s attractiveness and STI risk.
KW - Attractiveness
KW - Delay discounting
KW - HIV/AIDS
KW - Probability discounting
KW - STI
KW - Sexual risk behavior
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84979986546&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84979986546&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10508-016-0788-1
DO - 10.1007/s10508-016-0788-1
M3 - Article
C2 - 27473071
AN - SCOPUS:84979986546
SN - 0004-0002
VL - 46
SP - 2131
EP - 2144
JO - Archives of Sexual Behavior
JF - Archives of Sexual Behavior
IS - 7
ER -