Table 1.

Self-Reported Similarities Extended Quotes.

Theme I: Unprotected Oral Sex Used to Evaluate Penile Abnormalities
C.L., Age 25: “There’s several ways to do that if you wanted to, like giving head you can check it out pretty quickly, like oh what is that. If there’s something weird on it’s much easier to do, you want to be sly about it or just feeling around. . . Anytime I’ve ever received It [oral sex]. That’s honestly never crossed my mind to do it. But for somebody else. . .somebody had made a suggestion one time about using a condom during oral sex. And I’m like stupid [inaudible] why would you want to do that. . ..No, we did. Just without a condom.”
M.V., Age 20: “When I’m going to town, I’m definitely taking like inventory of the house, I guess I would say? Like, I would notice, and I know that I would notice, if something were either out of place or out of the norm. So I’d say yes, but I’m definitely not, let me see your junk up front. It’s more of a discrete kind of thing.”
R.V., Age 22: “Ah, no. I had a scare. . . I had an HIV scare once. I did the swab test and it came back positive, and then they did a Western Blot and that came back negative. At that time I was dating someone who was positive so that made it overly scary. I mean we did use condoms but we didn’t in the mouth and with oral sex and things like that.”
Theme II: Trust Promoting Unprotected Sex
C.L., Age 25: “I know several people in the gay community that don’t disclose their HIV status and go around and have unprotected sex and it’s scary. And there’s new things that pop up all the time like that killer strains of gonorrhea, that. . .while it’s not here it’s still scary, and people lie about the last time they were checked for things. . .it’s just a constant. . .There is just too much stigma involved, STDs in general. The there’s that scare, some rumors going around about people poking holes in condoms. Then you have the bug chasers. . . People who purposely try to contract STDs. There’s quite a few of them actually. I don’t know, attention. At that time I was dating someone who was positive so that made it overly scary. . .he didn’t disclose it at first. Well, someone else told me about his status. And he told me that he wasn’t going to tell me until he was ready. And I’m like I don’t think that’s the way that works, but okay. I’m like if I’m gonna trust somebody I need to think about it. I don’t have the problem asking the questions; it’s whether or not the other person answers the question because being truthful is you know part of it.”
S.F., Age 27: “If we’ve been tested together, that I’ve sort of underlying together in that sense that like. . .then you have confirmation from somebody. You don’t have somebody just saying, “Oh, I’ve been tested.” At that point you can like. . . If you go on in together and you hear the confirmation together, then you know for a fact. [Laughing]”
K.L., Age 21: [STI talk] “I don’t know. . .I guess it’s like I don’t want to offend them. But it’s for my health and I guess their health. It’s something that I want to ask. While it may be awkward it’s the responsible thing to do. I guess. . .like STDs, stuff like that, HIV. That’s the only thing that really makes me go out of my way. I make sure to try to be responsible.”
Theme III: Alcohol and Drugs Not Cited as a Reason for Casual Sex
N.B., Age 23: “Well, we’re not 100% sure what happened. But, I just don’t remember a huge chunk of my night at the bar. So, I woke up at a hotel and I didn’t have any clothes on. So, not really sure if something sexual happened but I just went to the doctor to make sure. I didn’t contract any diseases or anything. In the past, I used to use meth, and I would use meth before sex and things of that nature. But that’s about it, I never did anything else drug wise. But I don’t have to like get high before sex or drink before sex.”
S.F., Age 27: “I enjoy going out and having drinks and dinner. If we’re staying in, we hang out and have a couple of drinks and make things and enjoy, you know, taste and flavors and discussions of that. So I would say it’s far more culinary in a way for myself rather than just that feeling of, “Oh, I need to go drink.” Now, I guess the offset of that. . .that might cloud that is oftentimes when I am drinking I don’t get off as easily, so that sort of mitigates that. So there is, in a sense, a benefit to doing it. But I don’t necessarily feel like I have to go drink to go have sex. And I don’t think if I were to try and like. . .it’s far more occasional that I would be drinking and having sex than like drinking and then going in and having sex.”