Funding Source and Project Period:
HIV Center Pilot, 2006-2007

HIV Center Personnel:

Principal Investigator: Shari Dworkin, Ph.D.
Co-Principal Investigator: Alex Carballo-Dieguez, Ph.D.

Project Overview
(from abstract submitted to  HIV Center):

Research has shown that adherence to traditional masculine ideology puts men at risk for several negative health and mental health outcomes and is also associated with increased sexual risk behavior, a relationship that may be accentuated when a person's sense of masculinity is threatened (e.g., loss of job, changes in gender relations). However, little empirical research has investigated the relationship between one's own sense of masculinity, perceptions of gendered power, and sexual risk behavior. Although shifts in societal sexual behavior have been conceptually linked to changing norms of masculinity, few studies have empirically examined the relationship between threats to masculinity and whether men specifically resolve threats through sexual risk behavior.

To address this gap, we request support to conduct a pilot study of the relationship between individual conceptions of one's own masculinity, perceptions of gendered power and gender relations, threats to masculinity, and sexual risk behavior among 40 Puerto Rican men, ages 18-30, living in New York City. We examine differences across sexual identity (heterosexual and gay). Participants will be administered both a quantitative survey and a qualitative elicitation interview. The quantitative survey will assess sexual behavior, substance use, psychosocial characteristics, gender role conflict, gender equity, and masculine ideologies. The qualitative interviews will emphasize the context of participants' sexual risk and safer sex experiences and the ways that they are influenced by masculine ideology, self-identity as a man, and perceptions of gender relations.

<back to top>