The influence of type of sexual partnership on male condom use: empirical evidence from the South African construction industry

Abstract

There are indications that gender has an effect on individual risk factors and pathways to HIV diagnoses and treatment. Furthermore, there is growing recognition that to improve HIV-related health outcomes for men, it is important to understand their experiences and perspectives. Perhaps because of the physical nature of construction work, the South African construction industry is dominated by men. Given that employed men are a hard-to-reach community population group, the construction workplace offers an ideal environment for data collection and delivery of non-health-facility-based HIV prevention and treatment interventions. Furthermore, workers in the construction industry have been identified as being at a heightened risk of acquiring HIV and AIDS because of work-related travel, the ubiquity of transactional sex around worker hostels and having an increased likelihood of multiple and concurrent sex partnerships. As a consequence, this study examines the association between condom use and sexual partnerships among men working in the construction industry. A purposive cross-sectional survey was used to collect data from 450 workers across 18 construction sites in the Western Cape province of South Africa. The types of sexual partnership had three categories: regular sex partnerships, casual sex partnerships and sex worker partnerships. Frequency of condom use was determined to be highest with casual sex partners (51.2%), followed by sex workers (40.6%) and regular sex partners (25.6%). Hierarchical multiple linear regression analysis was used to examine the demographic, experiential, behavioural and cognitive predictors of condom use across the three categories of sexual partnership. The results indicate that an individual’s perception of control over condom use, and the perceived threat posed by HIV and AIDS are significantly associated with consistent condom use, even after accounting for differences in partner type. Implications of the findings are discussed, and directions for future research on the association between sexual partnerships and condom use are offered.

Keywords:

• clients of sex workers
• HIV and AIDS
• sexual behaviour
• men
• hierarchical regression analysis