HIV Risk Behavior in out-of school rural Af. Am. Young Adults

描述（由申请人提供）：最近的流行病学证据表明，生活在南部农村的非洲裔美国年轻人感染艾滋病毒的风险正在增加。佐治亚州农村的非裔美国人社区的特点是长期失业和贫穷，同时缺乏保健和教育资源。这些社区的年轻人在获得充分就业和高等教育方面面临重大障碍。面对这种机会的缺乏和由此带来的经济压力，许多人采取了高风险行为，包括使用药物和无保护的性活动。尽管接受高等教育的年轻人已经得到了广泛的研究，但获得有效样本的障碍阻碍了对影响未上大学的农村非洲裔美国年轻人的风险和保护因素的实证研究。本R-21申请中提出的研究解决了公共卫生需求，即开发新方法，以获取难以接触到的艾滋病毒和药物使用风险人群的有效样本，并确定阻止他们从事高风险行为的保护因素。本研究的目的是：(1)测试受访者驱动抽样（RDS）获取18-21岁辍学和生活在资源匮乏的农村环境中的非洲裔美国年轻人样本的可行性；(2)评估解释这些年轻人高危性行为的个人、人际和社会经济因素模型。RDS是一种新颖的技术，它将“雪球抽样”与数学模型相结合，该模型对样本进行加权以补偿其非随机性。RDS将用于获得240名农村非洲裔美国年轻人的样本。将收集数据来评估一个启发式模型，该模型包括以下预测因素：社会经济和个人压力因素；这些压力源诱发的负面情绪；亲社会成人的支持与社会化；个人保护过程，包括未来取向、自我调节、情绪调节和种族认同；与冒险同伴和性伴侣的关系；以及hiv相关风险行为的前因，例如对性保护行为的行为意图和态度。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Recent epidemiological evidence indicates that the risk of contracting HIV is increasing among African American young adults living in the rural South. African American communities in rural Georgia are characterized by chronic unemployment and poverty along with a dearth of health and educational resources. Young adults in these communities face significant barriers to adequate employment and higher education. Many respond to this lack of opportunity and the resulting economic pressure by engaging in high-risk behavior, including substance use and unprotected sexual activity. Although young adults attending higher education have been studied extensively, barriers to obtaining valid samples have prevented empirical research on the risk and protective factors that affect rural African American young adults who do not attend college. The research proposed in this R-21 application addresses the public health need to develop new approaches to obtaining valid samples of hard-to-reach members of populations at risk for HIV and substance use and to identify the protective factors that dissuade them from engaging in high risk behaviors. The objectives of this study are to (1) test the feasibility of Respondent-Driven Sampling (RDS) for obtaining a sample of rural African American young adults age 18-21 who are out of school and living in resource- poor, rural environments, and (2) evaluate a model of the personal, interpersonal, and socioeconomic factors that explain high-risk sexual behavior among these young people. RDS is a novel technique that combines "snowball sampling" with a mathematical model that weights the sample to compensate for its non-random nature. RDS will be used to obtain a sample of 240 rural African American young adults. Data will be gathered to evaluate a heuristic model that includes the following predictors: socioeconomic and personal stressors; the negative emotions these stressors induce; support and socialization from prosocial adults; intrapersonal protective processes, including a future orientation, self-regulation, emotion regulation, and racial identity; affiliations with risk-taking peers and sexual partners; and antecedents of HIV-related risk behavior, such as behavioral intentions and attitudes toward sexually protective behaviors.