Understanding gender socialization between African American mothers and daughters is an important component in designing culture-specific HIV prevention programs. This study combines qualitative and quantitative research to investigate characteristics in the daughter (e.g., sexual self-efficacy) gained, in part, from the mother/daughter relationship, that are most predictive of sexual attitudes. Attitudes are an important determinant of future behavior, and isolating and nurturing protective characteristics in adolescent girls may ultimately lead to more successful interventions aimed at reducing the spread of HIV. Focus groups of 11-14 year old girls will help design questions for semi-structured individual interviews with 30 girls and their mothers. The interviews, in turn, will provide a rich source of information about the relationships and their influence on sexual attitudes as well as to help select measures for the quantitative portion of the study. In this portion, a minimum of 105 girls will complete questionnaires on topics such as mother/daughter relationship quality, gender roles, racial socialization, sexual self-efficacy, and life course expectations. Results will increase knowledge about how the mother/daughter relationship affects sexual attitudes identify """"""""protective"""""""" characteristics in girls that are associated with less risky sexual attitudes.
