Elsevier

Journal of Adolescence

Volume 21, Issue 1, February 1998, Pages 15-29
Journal of Adolescence

Regular Article
“When you carry condoms all the boys think you want it”: negotiating competing discourses about safe sex

https://doi.org/10.1006/jado.1997.0126Get rights and content

Abstract

With the advent of HIV, sexual health campaigns and formal sex education in schools have worked to instil the concept of safe sex into the collective minds of Australia's youth. However the concept in its present guise is a fairly limited one. We argue in this paper that the predominant emphasis in education programmes on safe sex as condom use may be counter-productive for some young heterosexuals for two reasons. First, this strategy is male-focused and may not extrapolate well to young women who face special risks around pregnancy and rigid societal gender norms which govern sexual behaviour. Second, health promotion strategies aimed at young heterosexuals are based on an assumption of rational decision-making in sexual encounters and obscure the non-rational nature of arousal and desire, and the unequal power relations that exist between young men and women engaging in sex. Five hundred and twelve senior rural students participated in the study which included group discussions about sexuality and survey items which focused on the meanings of safe sex and the accessibility and use of condoms. The results showed that though most students identified condoms with safe sex, many were ambivalent about using them. Reasons given related to problems of negotiation, difficulties of access, and the risks which condoms gave no protection from, such as a sullied reputation. Perhaps, partly because of this, some students were looking to less secure methods of protection such as informal history-taking and monogamy. It is argued that successful sexual health promotion strategies must address the broad spectrum of concerns facing young men and women when they become sexually active and that consideration be given to the social context in which young people conduct their sexual lives.

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    The finding that 66% of females intended to use a condom during sex that evening, yet only 11% actually had a condom in their possession is particularly problematic, given the fact that women have both higher risk of contracting STIs and experiencing subsequent reproductive complications (Satterwhite et al., 2013). Health promotion strategies empowering young women to carry condoms instead of relying on their partners to do so are warranted; however, educators and programmers should understand this advice may be inconsistent with the traditional heterosexual sexual script for women (Hillier, Harrison, & Warr, 1998). For example, Hynie, Schuller, and Couperthwaite (2003) found that women carrying condoms were viewed by peers as being more sexually willing and having greater intentions to engage in sex than women who did not possess condoms.

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Laskey, L.Beavis, C.

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Reprint requests and correspondence should be addressed to Dr L. Hillier, National Centre in HIV Social Research, Centre for the Study of Sexually Transmissible Diseases, La Trobe University, 11-13 Lincoln Square South, Carlton South, Victoria 3053, Australia.

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