Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: We examined relationships between sexual risk-taking and negative affect following exposure to a narrative-based HIV-prevention video. The intervention was designed for young men who have sex with men (MSM) and takes a socially optimized learning approach, using a virtual social environment to simulate the interpersonal, emotional, and contextual cues of a sexual scenario. Higher levels of intervention-induced negative affect (particularly fear) were associated with a greater reduction in subsequent risk-taking for MSM who were exposed to an interactive version of the intervention in which they actively made decisions in the context of risk. No such associations were evident for men who passively viewed a noninteractive version. Moreover, the association was restricted to younger MSM, suggesting that developmental factors play a critical role in the intervention’s ability to link affect with subsequent behavior. Unlike traditional approaches, our intervention may result in the automatic encoding of affective cautionary signals.