Heterosexual Characters Research Articles

AIDS-Related Knowledge and Behavior Among Married Kenyan Men: A Behavioral Paradox?

The heterosexual character of HIV/AIDS transmission in sub-Saha-ran Africa, a context where men are dominant in sexual and reproductive matters, underscores the importance of assessing male behavior in sexual and related health arenas. Despite condom use being the recom-mended and expected behavioral response to knowledge about the fatal outcome of HIV/AIDS infection, use continues to be extremely low in sub-Saharan Africa. This article explores the relationship between various facets of knowledge about HIV/AIDS and condom use among married Kenyan men. The main finding is one of a significant inter-action effect of the recognition that it is impossible to visually identify infected parties and one's perception of self-risk. Although neither is in itself significant. simultaneously recognizing that healthy-looking persons may be infected and perceiving that one is himself not at risk significantly reduces condom use among men. This finding—of an interaction effect— plausibly explains why a perception of self-risk, on its own. does not necessarily translate into safe behavior. After all, those who believe they can identify infected persons may think they are at low risk because they avoid contact with the infected and, in selecting partners they deem free of infection, they may be less inclined to use condoms. This finding has implications for how specific aspects of AIDS-related knowledge are imparted to communities and individuals as well as for our understanding of other health-related behaviors.

Assessing Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gay Men: The Modern Homophobia Scale

The authors developed the Modern Homophobia Scale (MHS), a scale that includes measures of attitudes toward lesbians (MHS-L) and attitudes toward gay men (MHS-G). An initial pool of 97 items was generated by the authors based on a review of the literature on homophobia and feedback from several focus groups. Responses to the initial pool of items were factor analyzed. The final versions of the MHS-L and the MHS-G included items reflecting the following factors: Personal Discomfort with lesbians/gay men, Institutional Homophobia toward lesbians/gay men, and the Deviance/Changeability of female/male homosexuality. Although the Personal Discomfort, Institutional, and Deviance/Changeability factors were separable, they were highly correlated and showed little evidence of divergent validity. Reactions to gay, lesbian, and heterosexual characters in written vignettes provided initial support for the validity of the MHS. Both the MHS-L and MHS-G were significantly correlated with the Index of Homophobia and the Attitudes Toward Women Scale. A greater degree of homophobia on the MHS-L and MHS-G was associated with a greater degree of socially desirable responding as measured by the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding. Lower levels of homophobia on the MHS-L and MHS-G were associated with having lesbian and gay acquaintances and friends. On the MHS-L, men and women did not differ in their overall level of homophobia toward lesbians, but significant gender differences on MHS-L factor scores were present. Compared to men, women were more supportive of gay men on all three factors of the MHS-G.

THE SOCIAL INTERESTS OF YOUNG ADOLESCENTS

The fact that girls mature physiologically from one to two years ahead of boys is well-established. There appears to be corresponding maturation in social interests of a heterosexual character. Although this fact seems obvious to persons who have close contact with young adolescents it appears to have received scant attention from research workers in child psychology. In the course of examining pupils for admission to a junior high school in New York City the writer obtained activity preference records for boys and girls between the ages of 10 and 14 which indicated the nature and extent of the differences between them in social interests. These pupils came from homes above average in socio-economic status and they rated about 123 I.Q. on the average. (excerpt)