Acceptability of Smartphone Application-Based HIV Prevention Among Young Men Who Have Sex With Men

Young men who have sex with men (YMSM) are increasingly using mobile smartphone applications (“apps”), such as Grindr, to meet sex partners. A probability sample of 195 Grindrusing YMSM in Southern California were administered an anonymous online survey to assess patterns of and motivations for Grindr use in order to inform development and tailoring of smartphone-based HIV prevention for YMSM. The number one reason for using Grindr (29%) was to meet “hook ups.” Among those participants who used both Grindr and online dating sites, a statistically significantly greater percentage used online dating sites for “hook ups” (42%) compared to Grindr (30%). Seventy percent of YMSM expressed a willingness to participate in a smartphone app-based HIV prevention program. Development and testing of smartphone apps for HIV prevention delivery has the potential to engage YMSM in HIV prevention programming, which can be tailored based on use patterns and motivations for use

Negative attitudes to lesbians and gay men. Persecutors and victims

Negative attitudes toward lesbians and gay men widespread in multiple spheres including mass media, politics, public institutions, pseudoscientific contexts, and interpersonal relationships can be very distressing and sometimes unbearable for the victims. The adoption ofthe term “homophobia” [Weinberg (Society and the healthy homosexual, 1972)], although it is not entirely satisfactory, can be considered a milestone in Social Sciences because it marked the transition of scientific paradigm from homosexuality (and its “causes”) to antigay hostility (and its causes). For clinical and research purposes, it is important to consider the role of prejudice in affecting psychological well-being and producing minority stress in gay people and their families. At the same time, a comprehensive understanding of sexual prejudice as a form of abuse is necessary to develop prevention policies and practices (e.g., against homophobic bullying) and to avoid antigay biases and secondary victimization (e.g., in the clinical settings). Some tools for the assessment of both explicit and implicit sexual prejudice (both in straight and gay people) will be briefly discussed