142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

Home Events & Meetings Annual Meeting Schedule & Program

Online Program

Annual Meeting Recordings are now available for purchase

307165
Virtual Network Characteristics and Sexual Risk Behavior among Emerging Adults in the United States

142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition (November 15 - November 19, 2014): http://www.apha.org/events-and-meetings/annual
Monday, November 17, 2014

Stephanie Cook, MPH, DrPH , Health Behavior and Health Education Department, The Univeristy of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
José Arturo Bauermeister, MPH, PhD , Department of Health Behavior and Health Education, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Marc Zimmerman, PhD , Prevention Research Center of Michigan, University of Michigan School of Public Health, Ann Arbor, MI
Background: Emerging adults (ages 18 to 24) account for a large proportion of all sexually transmitted infections (STIs), HIV infections, and unintended pregnancies in the United States. Given the increased availability and usage of online social networking sites, we examined how emerging adults’ online peer networks were associated with recent sexual behaviors for males and females.

Methods: We used ego-network data collected from emerging adults across the United States (N=1,687; 52% female; 76% White) to examine how virtual peers’ norms (e.g., acceptance of HIV/STI infections, pregnancy) and network characteristics (i.e. network size and density; ties’ closeness, race, age and sex similarities) were associated with participants’ unprotected vaginal intercourse occasions (UVI) in the last 30 days. We used generalized linear models with a Poisson distribution for our analyses. 

Results: Females reporting ties that endorsed HIV/STI permissive peer norms (AOR=1.30, p<.05) and ties who were female (AOR=1.17, p<.05) reported greater UVI. Males with peers endorsing permissive HIV/STI (AOR=.75, p<.001) and pregnancy norms (AOR=.43, p <.001) were less likely to report UVI.  Furthermore, UVI odds increased among males who felt close to their peers (AOR=1.42, p <.001), who had dense networks (AOR=11.91, p <.001), and had ties similar to their race (AOR=3.30, p <.001).

Conclusion: Our results suggest that researchers and practitioners may need to address online peer norms and emerging adults’ virtual network composition when developing online prevention tools.  Further, our results suggest that virtual prevention and intervention tools may require practitioners to tailor these approaches differently for males and females.

Learning Areas:

Public health or related research
Social and behavioral sciences

Learning Objectives:
Evaluate how features of virtual social networks influence sexual risk behaviors among emerging adults. Explore potential sex difference in the relationship between virtual network characteristics and sexual risk behaviors among emerging adults.

Keyword(s): Sexual Risk Behavior, Youth

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: My research focuses on understanding social relationships and health among emerging adults in the United States. I have had one federally funded grant and am in the process of writing several more federally funded grant examining features of social networks and risk behavior.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 3209.3: Sex, sexuality, and sexual behaviors