The Role of Friends and Peers in Emerging Adults’ Sexual Behavior

2021 ◽  
pp. 274-294
Author(s):  
Haylee K. DeLuca Bishop

Friends and peers play an important role in emerging adults’ sexual attitudes and sexual behaviors. This chapter highlights how friends and peers provide a context for interacting with sexual partners and engaging in activities, such as drinking alcohol, that make sexual behavior more likely. Furthermore, this chapter discusses how friends and peers help emerging adults interpret their sexual experiences through social norms and communication. In addition, the chapter provides recommendations for future research investigating how friends and peers impact emerging adults’ sexual attitudes and behaviors, including how peer influence differs across time, based on relationship context or based on individual characteristics, such as gender, sexual orientation, college status, and cultural background.

2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 43
Author(s):  
Chindy Kencana Sari ◽  
Marselius Sampe Tondok ◽  
Darmawan Muttaqin

Sexual desire can be one of the antecedents for individual premarital sexual behavior. Otherwise, sexual self-control can prevent individuals from engaging premarital sexual behavior. This study aimed to examine the role of self-control in moderating the relationship between sexual desire and premarital sexual behavior. This study involved 209 emerging adults (18-25 years old) who were dating and not undergoing a long-distance relationship. The current study used Premarital Sexual Permissiveness measurement, dyadic sexual desire subscale from Sexual Desire Inventory-II, general sex-drive and stimulus-elicited sex-drive subscales from Perceived Sexual Control to measure premarital sexual behavior, sexual desire, and sexual self-control respectively. Results of regression analysis showed that sexual self-control did not moderate the relationship between sexual desire and kissing (∆R2 = 0.006, p > 0.05), as well as sexual desire and petting (∆R2 = 0.001, p > 0.05). However, self-control could be a moderator in the relationship between sexual desire and intercourse (∆R2 = 0.027, p < 0.01).


2021 ◽  
pp. 295-311
Author(s):  
Angela M. Kaufman-Parks ◽  
Monica A. Longmore ◽  
Wendy D Manning ◽  
Peggy C. Giordano

Much prior research acknowledges that peers influence adolescents’ sexual behaviors. Yet few studies have explored whether and how peers influence sexual decision making among emerging adults, especially among those in committed intimate partnerships, while also accounting for dynamics specific to the intimate relationship and respondents’ sociodemographic characteristics. Drawing on longitudinal data from the Toledo Adolescent Relationships Study, this report examined multiple aspects of peer influence on three different sexual behaviors among emerging adults: sexual non-exclusivity, number of casual sex partners, and lifetime number of sex partners. It was found that having more sexually liberal peers and peers who engaged in criminal activity significantly influenced emerging adults’ self-reported numbers of casual and lifetime sex partners, as well as the frequency of engagement in sexually non-exclusive behaviors among those in committed dating, cohabiting, and marital partnerships. This report discusses potential theoretical mechanisms linking these relationships and provides suggestions for future research.


2021 ◽  
pp. 79-98
Author(s):  
Heidi A. Lyons ◽  
George Sanders

This chapter provides a theoretical and empirical overview of the sexual attitudes, beliefs, and values expressed by emerging adults. It highlights contemporary research that represents the changing patterns in this sociocultural arena. Furthermore, it is contended that because attitudes, beliefs, and values contribute to the makeup of sexual subjectivities, these subjectivities can best be understood within broader assemblages. Thus, the chapter is loosely organized around the following themes: peers, families, religion, and visual media. The chapter concludes by highlighting the absence of academic inquiries related to queer identified emerging adults and persons who are not enrolled in college, and it suggests areas for future research.


1993 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 315-318 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary K. Leak

This research had two objectives: (a) to extend our understanding of the sexual behavior, attitudes, and love styles of religiously mature and immature individuals using recent measures of love styles and sexual attitudes and (b) to investigate, for the first time, the sexual and love correlates of the quest religious orientation. The results are consistent with prior research using other measures, and they suggest that intrinsically religious individuals are highly discriminating in their conservative approach to sexuality, while extrinsics are somewhat self-serving. While only exploratory, these results should encourage scholars and practitioners to appreciate the highly complex relationships between religiosity and sexuality, and that global statements (e.g., religious individuals are sexually conservative) need to take into account a particular individual's religious orientation as well as the nature of the sexual dimension being considered.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (6) ◽  
pp. 439-442
Author(s):  
Margherita Lanz ◽  
Joyce Serido

Current global economic instability has exacerbated the challenges of contemporary emerging adulthood and increased the urgency of examining financial instability as a life condition during this life stage. For this special issue, we assembled eight papers from different countries to examine how emerging adults are navigating financial instability. In the current introduction to the special issue, we identified the main themes that emerged from the collected studies: the role of family, emerging adults’ financial self-agency, financial disruptions and wellbeing, and the processes linking financial factors and positive development. Overall, these studies demonstrate that while the overall processes linking finances and development may be similar in different nations, the specificity of each context highlights the need to consider the important role of cultural norms and attitudes. We conclude this introduction, suggesting future research paths and implications for educators and practitioners that provide financial educators programs.


Author(s):  
Gregory L. Carter ◽  
Maryanne L. Fisher

This handbook has presented a wide range of theoretical perspectives on the motivations, attitudes, and behaviors involved in female competition. Using a metatheoretical framework, the contributors have examined how, when, and why women compete. This conclusion articulates the book’s main themes, beginning with evidence regarding women as active, competitive individuals and the value of mating information, addressing topics such as women’s competitive choices regarding mate copying, mate poaching, and mate retention. It then considers the role of intrasexual aggression in adolescence in relation to dating and reproduction, the importance of Operational Sex Ratio (OSR) to female competition, the concept of cooperative mothering or allomothering, and infanticide. It also discusses women as competitors in both traditional and novel social arenas as well as the role of women’s physiology in their competitive behaviors. Finally, it suggests directions for future research on topics that warrant further scrutiny.


2018 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justin R. Garcia ◽  
Amanda N. Gesselman ◽  
Sean G. Massey ◽  
Susan M. Seibold-Simpson ◽  
Ann M. Merriwether

AbstractLittle is known about the role of affectionate behaviours — factors traditionally understood within the context of romantic relationships — in uncommitted ‘casual sex’ encounters. In a sample of U.S. undergraduate emerging adults aged 18–25 years (N= 639) we conducted a preliminary internet-based questionnaire investigation into the role of affectionate behaviours — operationalised here as cuddling, spending the night and cuddling, foreplay, and eye gazing — across two sexual relationship contexts: (committed) traditional romantic relationships and (uncommitted) casual sex encounters. While affectionate behaviours were desired more often in romantic relationships than in casual sexual encounters, many respondents (both men and women) engaged in these affectionate behaviours during casual sexual encounters as well. This was especially pronounced in those who expressed a preference for casual sex encounters over romantic relationships: in a casual sex context these participants were about 1.5 times as likely to cuddle, 1.5 times as likely to spend the night and cuddle, and nearly 5 times as likely to engage in foreplay with a partner. The current study emphasises the importance of considering relationship context in sexuality and relationship research, and the need for further theoretical and empirical research on dimensions of intimacy, including affection, in people's diverse romantic and sexual lives.


2016 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 862-878 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emilie Eve Gravel ◽  
Marta Yolande Young ◽  
Chantal Marielle Darzi ◽  
Marcela Olavarria-Turner ◽  
Andrea Ming-See Lee

2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (8) ◽  
pp. 1097-1119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jill R. Bowers ◽  
Chris Segrin ◽  
Nicholas Joyce

The consequences of risky sexual behaviors are a serious health concern. We hypothesized that the transitional instability that occurs as a part of typical developmental changes in emerging adulthood would be positively associated with sexual risk taking. A survey of emerging adults showed that the instability–sexual risk-taking association was positive and significant as predicted. Moreover, psychological distress (depression and loneliness) and dysfunctional drinking motivations (drinking to ease emotional pain or to gain peer acceptance) moderated and intensified the association between instability and sexual risk taking. Implications for future research with instability and risk-taking behaviors in emerging adulthood are discussed.


2015 ◽  
Vol 6 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tessa A.M. Lansu ◽  
Antonius H.N. Cillessen ◽  
Johan C. Karremans

This study addressed the role of influencer and influencee peer status in social influence of status-unrelated behaviours among emerging adults, while disentangling two forms of peer status, being liked (preference) and being powerful (popularity). Peer influence was examined in 67 women (M age = 20.5 years, SD = 2.1 years) using an experimental design. Popularity of the influencers and influencees (participants), as well as influencees’ preference and self-esteem were considered. Peer influence was measured through imitation of status-unrelated behaviours and task partner choice. In both tasks, influencees moved away from, rather than towards, a popular peer. Popular young women with low self-esteem were most likely to imitate a popular peer. Unpreferred young women with high self-esteem were least likely to imitate a popular peer. The findings demonstrate that the role of peer status in social influence processes is not limited to adolescence, and that the peer status of influencers and the influencees continues to affect social influence on status-unrelated behaviour in emerging adulthood.


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