title: Observed Normativity and Deviance in Friendship Dyads' Conversations About Sex and the Relations With Youths' Perceived Sexual Peer Norms.
abstract: The current study examined the relations between observed normativity and deviance during adolescents' and young adults' conversations about sex with their friends and their individual perceptions of sexual peer norms. Participants were 16-21-year-old same-sex friendship dyads (31 male and 30 female dyads) who performed a peer interaction task that consisted of five discussion assignments focusing on party planning, sexual double standards, condom use, homosexuality, and consensual sex. Videotaped discussions were coded to capture the amounts of normative talk (e.g., consistent with notions of healthy sexuality) and deviant talk (e.g., consistent with notions of risky sexuality), and the verbal or nonverbal reinforcement thereof. Participants also completed individual questionnaires to assess their perceived sexual descriptive norms, injunctive norms, pressure, and risk norms among their peers. Actor-partner interdependence model (APIM) results revealed that youths' perceived descriptive, injunctive, and risk norms, but not their experienced peer pressure, were related to both their own (actor effects) and their friends' (partner effects) normativity and deviance. Overall, more deviance was related to perceiving friends to be more sexually active, more approving of having sex, and engaging in more risky sex, whereas more normativity was related to these perceptions in the opposite direction. Gender differences in the APIMs indicated that interactive normativity and deviance was related to perceived descriptive, injunctive, and risk norms for boys, but only to perceived injunctive norms for girls. These findings demonstrate the importance of assessing the dyadic nature of youths' sexual communication with friends, their relation to individual sexual peer norm perceptions, and gender differences therein.
authors.affiliation: Research Institute of Child Development and Education (Research Priority Area YIELD), Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, University of Amsterdam, P.O. Box 15776, 1001 NG, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. D.vandeBongardt@uva.nl.
authors.forename: Daphne
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: van de Bongardt
authors.affiliation: Utrecht Centre for Child and Adolescent Studies, Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Ellen
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Reitz
authors.affiliation: Research Institute of Child Development and Education (Research Priority Area YIELD), Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, University of Amsterdam, P.O. Box 15776, 1001 NG, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Geertjan
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Overbeek
authors.affiliation: Sexology Department, Faculty of Human Sciences, Université du Québec à Montréal, Montreal, Canada.
authors.forename: Marie-Aude
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Boislard
authors.affiliation: Behavioural Science Institute, Faculty of Social Sciences, Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Bill
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Burk
authors.affiliation: Utrecht Centre for Child and Adolescent Studies, Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Maja
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Deković
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D003142:Communication; D005260:Female; D033062:Friends / Q000523:psychology*; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010379:Peer Group; D012309:Risk-Taking; D021841:Safe Sex; D012737:Sex Factors; D012725:Sexual Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D012938:Social Perception; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Actor–partner interdependence model (APIM); Adolescents; Friendships; Peer norms; Sexual behavior