OBJECTIVE: To ascertain Army women's specific sexual health information needs prior to developing a theoretically based, self-administered intervention to promote safer sexual practices during deployment. DESIGN: An exploratory design was employed to address the research questions. PARTICIPANTS: Participants (N= 131) were Army women recruited from Army posts around the United States. The women ranged in age from 18 to 68 years (M= 30.8, SD= 10.5), were of varied ethnicity, and had an average time in service of 8.0 years (SD= 6.6). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Desire for knowledge about sexual health and safer sexual practices were measured with forced-choice responses based upon DiIorio's Safer Sex Questionnaire (DiIorio, Parsons, Lehr, Adame, & Carlone, 1992) and open-ended questions to assess past information received, quality of that information, and information desired. RESULTS: Participants had moderate levels of sexual risk behaviors. Forced-choice responses yielded little desire for information regarding safer sexual practices. Women identified different sexual health and safer sexual information needs based upon whether they were at a normal duty station or during deployment. CONCLUSIONS: Participants did not identify many information needs; however, their sexual behaviors indicate the need for interventions.
OBJECTIVE: To ascertain Army women's specific sexual health information needs prior to developing a theoretically based, self-administered intervention to promote safer sexual practices during deployment. DESIGN: An exploratory design was employed to address the research questions. PARTICIPANTS: Participants (N= 131) were Army women recruited from Army posts around the United States. The women ranged in age from 18 to 68 years (M= 30.8, SD= 10.5), were of varied ethnicity, and had an average time in service of 8.0 years (SD= 6.6). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Desire for knowledge about sexual health and safer sexual practices were measured with forced-choice responses based upon DiIorio's Safer Sex Questionnaire (DiIorio, Parsons, Lehr, Adame, & Carlone, 1992) and open-ended questions to assess past information received, quality of that information, and information desired. RESULTS:Participants had moderate levels of sexual risk behaviors. Forced-choice responses yielded little desire for information regarding safer sexual practices. Women identified different sexual health and safer sexual information needs based upon whether they were at a normal duty station or during deployment. CONCLUSIONS:Participants did not identify many information needs; however, their sexual behaviors indicate the need for interventions.
Authors: Joseph L Goulet; Richard A Martinello; Harini Bathulapalli; Diana Higgins; Mary A Driscoll; Cynthia A Brandt; Julie A Womack Journal: Med Care Date: 2014-12 Impact factor: 2.983