Springer Science and Business Media LLC

Puerto Rican women are at high risk for the heterosexual transmission of HIV. I examined social and interpersonal aspects of communication about sex in regard to safer sex practices within a specific cultural context. Participants in this study were 42 heterosexual Puerto Rican adults living in Puerto Rico, who ranged in age from 18 to 56 years. Participants were interviewed regarding their sexual communication, sexual practices, and their perceptions regarding the roles of culture and gender in the practice of safer sex. Inductive qualitative analysis showed that three factors limit meaningful communication about sex in Puerto Rico: (1) machismo, (2) the changing role of virginity, and (3) the silencing of both men and women. Implications for theory-based inventions informed by an interpersonal communication perspective are discussed.

Three studies were designed to examine the relationships among gender, sex role orientation, and responses to dissatisfaction in close relationships. Four ways of reacting to dissatisfaction were explored: (a) exit — ending or threatening to end the relationship; (b) voice — activity and constructively attempting to improve conditions; (c) loyalty — passively but optimistically waiting for conditions to improve; and (d) neglect — passively allowing conditions to deteriorate. Study 1 assessed generalized responses among university students; Study 2 assessed generalized responses among adults residing in the local community; and Study 3 assessed response tendencies among lesbian, gay male, and heterosexual women and men. Greater psychological femininity was consistently associated with greater tendencies to respond to relationship problems with voice and loyalty. However, there was little evidence of a link between level of femininity and tendencies to respond with exit and neglect. Greater psychological masculinity was associated with lesser tendencies toward voice and loyalty, and there was some evidence of a link between high psychological masculinity and tendencies toward exit and neglect. Gender was not consistently related to response tendencies, though there was very weak evidence that in comparison to females, males may be more likely to engage in exit and neglect responses.

Two studies were conducted to determine if playing a video game that emphasized the body would increase negative body-image. Both studies [study 1 (N = 51); college-aged males from the Midwestern USA; and study 2 (N = 32); college-aged females from the Midwestern USA] had participants complete body image measures, play a video game that displayed muscular or thin characters for 15 min, and then complete post-game body image measures. Results showed that participants in both studies had significantly lower body esteem after video game play. Further, these findings were independent of the time spent playing video games and body mass index. This suggests that video games have a negative influence on the body-image of players.

This study reports on the psychometric properties of the Femininity Ideology Scale (FIS) from the responses of 407 undergraduate participants in the USA. Factor analysis supported the five factor structure. Cronbach alpha coefficients of the factors and total scale were adequate. Support for discriminant validity was found after examining the relationship between the FIS and the Bem Sex Role Inventory, which measures feminine traits. Support for convergent validity was found after examining, first, with the entire sample, the relationships between the FIS and the Male Role Norm Inventory, and second, with the female sample, the relationships between the FIS and the Feminist Identity Development Scale. We also found that FIS scores vary in relationship to the social contextual variables of race/ethnicity and sex.

This study examined attitudes about body image and racial identity among Black women at a predominately White college in the United States. We conducted in-depth qualitative interviews with 34 women about their school experiences, family, racial identity, self-esteem, and body image. We found that early childhood influences including family and school environment had profound impacts on their racial identity and body image. Through a qualitative analysis based in grounded theory, we found that participants’ identification with White and/or Black culture produced levels of body satisfaction and a set of beauty ideals that generally corresponded to four racial identity groups: identification with White or Black culture, floating between both, or having a diverse self-identity.

Sixty-six mothers and their 4-year-old children recorded conversations about the children's experiences during a typical preschool day. Each dyad's ethnic background was either Hispanic or Anglo, with similar numbers of mother—daughter and mother—son pairs represented in each ethnic group. Both low- and middle-income dyads participated. The mother—child conversations were analyzed in order to identify the dyads' tendencies to elaborate on discussions of aspects of the school day related to learning, other individuals, and behavioral conduct as a function of the ethnicity of the dyad and the gender of the child. Gender of child was associated with dyads' propensities to devote differing percentages of their total conversational utterances to the discussion of other individuals and behavioral conduct, and interacted with ethnicity to produce different patterns of discussion related to the topic of learning. Mothers of boys used more elaborative utterances in their discussion of learning-related topics than did mothers of girls. Possible implications of these results for children's subsequent school-related attitudes and performance are discussed.

African American, Latino, and Asian first-year college men (36) saw The Men’s Program, an all-male rape prevention workshop, and wrote answers to four open-ended questions to determine how men from non-white groups react to a commonly used rape prevention program. Using a multi-stage inductive analysis, participant responses fell into five main themes including reinforced current beliefs and/or no changes, increased awareness of rape and its effects on survivors, increased understanding of consent, plans to intervene if a rape might occur, and plans to change behavior in their own intimate situations. Participants mentioned specific ways in which they planned to change personal behavior, and ways in which they planned to intervene if they saw potentially dangerous situations.

We conducted a primary study and a meta-analysis on the relation of trait “subordination” measures to trait measures of sensitivity to nonverbal cues, in order to test the hypothesis that more subordinate individuals have enhanced ability to decode nonverbal cues. In the primary study, subordination measures included socioeconomic background, two dominance scales, a capacity for status scale, a control by powerful others scale, self-ratings of leadership and social status in high school, and for women, measures of sex role values. Sensitivity to nonverbal cues was measured using three psychometric tests, Results showed little overall support for the subordination hypothesis, and some results were significantly opposite to the prediction. The meta-analysis showed that dominance, capacity for status, socioeconomic status, and women's sex role values all had relations to nonverbal sensitivity that were opposite to the predictions of the subordination hypothesis. Future prospects for the subordination hypothesis with respect to nonverbal sensitivity are discussed.