title: Responsibility and risk: understanding how PSA messages can encourage condom use.
abstract: This article qualitatively examines how female college students interpret their responsibility for maintaining healthy sexual behaviors. A series of nine in-depth interviews was conducted to assess their perceptions on a broad range of sexual health topics including personal fears, relationships, monogamy, and sexual relationships. In addition, the paper addresses how these women negotiate condom use, responsibility issues regarding this negotiation, and perceived risk for contracting AIDS during unprotected sex. This study has implications for health educators, as well as for designers of public service advertisements, as it provides an in-depth look at why college women do not use protection even when it is available to them.
authors.affiliation: Department of Advertising, University of Florida, Gainesville 32611, USA. dtreise@jou.ufl.edu
authors.forename: D M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Treise
authors.forename: M F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Weigold
authors.forename: A R
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Gotthoffer
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Prolman
mesh_terms: D000163:Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome / Q000517:prevention & control; D000329:Advertising; D001294:Attitude to Health; D017280:Condoms / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D005260:Female; D015438:Health Behavior; D006801:Humans; D010565:Persuasive Communication; D012307:Risk Factors; D012725:Sexual Behavior; D012749:Sexually Transmitted Diseases / Q000517:prevention & control; D012941:Social Responsibility; D015144:Southeastern United States; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology; D014495:Universities