Parent Discussions About Safe Sex and Subsequent Safe Sex Discussions with Sexual Partners Among College Students

CREVELING 57

This study examined how the frequency of parental discussion about safe sex relates to subsequent safe sex conversations with their sexual partners and if they had the safe sex discussion prior to sexual activity. College students (N = 114; M age = 19.97, SD = 2.93; 63.9% female) from a university in the San Joaquin Valley in California completed an online survey about retrospective parental discussion about safe sex frequency and safe sex conversation with their current sexual partners (i.e., condom use, birth control, etc.). Regression analysis was used to examine if the number of times a parent discussed safe sex with the participant predicted their own discussions with a current romantic partner (1 = We’ve talked about it once; 2 = We’ve talked about it two or three times; 3 = We’ve talked about it more than three times). We found that the frequency of parental discussions about safe sex (condom use, sexually transmitted infections, HIV, and unintended pregnancy) did not significantly predict an increase in the frequency of these discussions with their current sexual partners (p > .05). However, among females, frequency of discussions about safe sex with current sexual partners did significantly predict frequency of STI prevention methods during sexual encounters (β =.60, p <.001). Implications are discussed further.