On the association between sexual attraction and adolescent risk behavior involvement: Examining mediation and moderation.
On the basis of a large-scale survey of high-school youth, the authors compared adolescents reporting exclusively heterosexual, mostly heterosexual, bisexual, and predominately same-sex attraction based on high-risk involvement across a range of risk behaviors. Bisexual and same-sex attracted groups were characterized by heightened high-risk involvement relative to the other two groups. Mediation analysis was used to determine whether these group disparities were explained by a set of normative predictive factors spanning multiple life domains. Differences among a combined exclusively/mostly heterosexual attraction group and both the bisexual and same-sex attraction groups were attenuated (66% and 50%, respectively) after incorporating the hypothesized intervening predictive factors, providing evidence of partial mediation. Primary mediators included intrapersonal (attitudes toward risk-taking; academic orientation), interpersonal (peer victimization; parental relationships; unstructured activities), and environmental (substance availability) factors. Mediation results were consistent across participant age and sex. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.
Busseri
Michael A
MA
Department of Psychology, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario L2S3A1, Canada. mbusseri@brocku.ca
Willoughby
Teena
T
Chalmers
Heather
H
Bogaert
Anthony F
AF
D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D019548:Crime Victims / Q000523:psychology; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D033062:Friends / Q000523:psychology; D015438:Health Behavior; D020010:Heterosexuality / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D007604:Juvenile Delinquency / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D008297:Male; D010287:Parent-Child Relations; D010379:Peer Group; D010555:Personality Inventory; D015995:Prevalence; D012111:Residence Characteristics / Q000145:classification; D012309:Risk-Taking; D012725:Sexual Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D019529:Sexuality / Q000523:psychology*; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires