Perceived Partner Non-Monogamy and Incident Sexual Partnership Concurrency: Results from The Project on Partner Dynamics (POPD)

Background: 

Concurrent sexual partnerships may contribute to STI and HIV transmission. Most concurrency studies have used cross-sectional designs and, as a result, little is known about motives for initiating concurrency.  

Methods:

We analyzed longitudinal data for 537 adults aged 18-30 to estimate the prevalence and incidence of concurrency, and its association with perceived partner non-monogamy (PPNM).  Participants were interviewed every four months for one year. PPNM was defined as perceiving that a current partner was non-monogamous in the preceding 4 months. Concurrency was defined as an overlap in reported sexual partnership dates. Generalized estimating equations were used to estimate risk ratios (RRs), with backwards elimination to create a final model.

Results:

Participants (52% female, 30% non-Hispanic White; 28% non-Hispanic Black, 28% Hispanic/Latino, and 14% other race/ethnicity) had a median age of 23 years and lifetime mean of 15 sex partners. For the four interviews (baseline, 4-, 8-, and 12-months), prevalence of concurrency was, respectively, 38.7%, 26.9%, 23.1%, and 24.5%. The incidence of concurrency among persons with at most 1 partner at the previous interview was 8.5%, 10.9%, 17.8% at 4-, 8-, and 12-months, respectively. Participants with PPNM were more likely to initiate concurrency in crude analyses (RR=4.5; 95% Confidence Interval (CI)=3.1, 6.5), and analyses adjusted for male sex and lifetime number of sex partners (aRR=1.3, 95%CI= 1.1, 1.4).

Conclusions: 

Along with male sex and lifetime number of sex partners, perceived partner non-monogamy significantly predicted 4-month incident concurrency. Among young adults, one’s own concurrency may be influenced by perceived partners’ concurrency.