MASSER AF GRUNDE TIL USIKKER SEX: En undersøgelse af gode forklaringer

Abstract

Anders Dahl: Plenty of Reasons for Unsafe

Sex. An Investigation of Good Explanations

Information campaigns on HIV/AIDS have

been running for more than ten years, but

still it is difficult to demonstrate any changes

in the sexual behaviour of the Danish

population, except in regard of men who

have sex with men. Analyses of dialogues of

telephone counselling at the AIDS Hotline in

Copenhagen give insights into the explanations

that counselling-seeking persons

themselves give conceming their unsafe

sexual behaviour. It appears that safe sex is

generally considered easy and simple, and

therefore instances of unsafe sexual behaviour

come to be regarded as “slips” and

not as a pattem of behaviour. Choices of

sexual behaviour are not determined by

knowledge alone, but also by culturally informed

personal experience and the context

of the sexual act. The article points towards a

new strategy in future HIV/AIDS-related

work, putting greater emphasis on dialogue

with people with risk behaviour, e.g. in

connection with HIV-testing. The use of the

data collected at the hotline demonstrates

new paths in the difficult field of sex research.

Also, it appears from the data that the

study of the so-called risk groups for HIV is

probably not the most useful way to reach an

understanding of sexual risk taking, as reasons

for unsafe sex transcend such groups.