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Affect and Condom Use Among Men Who have Sex with Men: A Daily Diary Study

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Abstract

Men who have sex with men (MSM) are disproportionally affected by HIV. Although some theoretical models created to explain why individuals engage in risky sexual behavior contain an affective component, there has been relatively little focus on the influence of affect on sexual risk-taking. The goal of this study is to investigate the association between affect and condom use among MSM using an archival dataset from a survey of users of a popular sex-oriented website. Multilevel modeling was used to analyze daily diary data from 2871 MSM. At the within-person level, positive affect was positively related to condomless anal sex (CAS), whereas negative affect was negatively related to CAS. However, these results were qualified by interactions of trait affect and relationship to sex partner. These findings suggest that interventions focused on emotional regulation may have the potential to reduce CAS among MSM.

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Correspondence to Elissa L. Sarno.

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Elissa L. Sarno, Jonathan J. Mohr, and Joshua G. Rosenberger declares that they have no conflict of interest

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Sarno, E.L., Mohr, J.J. & Rosenberger, J.G. Affect and Condom Use Among Men Who have Sex with Men: A Daily Diary Study. AIDS Behav 21, 1429–1443 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10461-016-1464-0

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