African American and Latino young men who have sex with men (YMSM) are at particularly high risk of HIV infection. Substance use is highly correlated with unprotected sex and other sexual behaviors that may lead to HIV infection. Though the risks associated with these 'sex-drug'connections have been extensively studied in some MSM populations, they have been largely unexplored among African American and Latino YMSM, particularly through in-depth, qualitative investigations. The proposed study will explore how African American and Latino YMSM discuss 'sex-drugs'- substances that they report using in association with sex in the past 30 days - and how these substances become associated with sexual behaviors and sexual risk. Socio-cultural theories of risk, ecological theories, and sexual scripts theory provide the framework for our investigation. The analyses will be situated in these theories and further guided by our preliminary research on substance use and HIV risk with these populations. Grounded theory methodologies will also be used to provide new insights into how substances become associated with sex among African American and Latino YMSM. The proposed study aims to: 1) to identify how and where African American and Latino YMSM use sex-drugs, 2) to explore the construct of sex-drugs by investigating sex-drug scripts used by YMSM, and 3) to examine relationships between these sex-drug scripts and HIV risk behaviors among African American and Latino YMSM. To accomplish these aims, we propose a two phase, multi-method study. In phase 1, a qualitative health researcher will collect field notes focusing on the central construct of sex-drug use at approximately 12 public venues frequented by members of the target population. The ethnographer will also train five African American and Latino YMSM to keep 'conversational diaries'based on their own participant observations of their peers'discussions of sex, drugs, and sex-drugs. In phase 2, we will purposefully recruit 40 (20 African American and 20 Latino) YMSM, aged 21 to 24, who report using alcohol, crystal, and/or marijuana during sex with men in the last 30 days for in-depth individual interviews and a brief complementary quantitative survey. We will analyze these field notes, interviews, and survey data to identify important ecological factors that influence sex-drug scripts used by African American and Latino YMSM. The study will also contribute to the larger fields of substance abuse and HIV research by demonstrating novel ways to examine sex-drug scripts. We expect that specific sex-drug scripts that are employed and revised by YMSM will influence their substance use and sexual risk behaviors. The study data can be used to inform HIV and substance abuse prevention interventions targeting these specific populations, ultimately, helping to reduce HIV infections among African American and Latino YMSM.
African American and Latino young men who have sex with men (YMSM) are at particularly high risk of HIV infection. Though the risks associated with these 'sex-drug'connections have been extensively studied in some MSM populations, they have been largely unexplored among African American and Latino YMSM. The study data can be used to inform HIV and substance abuse prevention interventions targeting these specific populations, ultimately, helping to reduce HIV infections among African American and Latino YMSM.
