ResearchProjects

Despite considerable attention to the sexual health of young men who have sex with men (YMSM), new HIV and sexually transmitted infections are rapidly increasing among this population. A critical aspect of sexual behavior among YMSM is sexual socialization – the process by which individuals gain knowledge, attitudes, and norms about sexuality, sexual behavior, and sexual risk. Sexual scripts theory provides a framework to understand the sexual socialization process, specifically how individuals receive cultural scenarios from external sources (cultural scripts), interpret them (intrapsychic scripts), and enact them with sexual partners (interpersonal scripts). The study conducted mixed-methods interviews with a diverse sample of YMSM to better understand their increasing rates of infection and to inform the development of more effective interventions for them.