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 "This is important because women could be especially vulnerable to
the negative consequences of unprotected sex (e.g., unwanted
pregnancy, STIs) when under the influence of alcohol and/or
marijuana," said lead study author Jumi Hayaki, a psychology
researcher at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester,
Massachusetts.
"Our results seem to indicate that men's sexual behavior, at least
with respect to condomless vaginal sex with an opposite-sex partner,
becomes disinhibited at a higher threshold than for women," Hayaki
said by email.
When women ages 18 to 25 drink and smoke pot on the same day,
they're more than three times more likely to have unprotected sex
than on days when they don't use either substance, the study found.
Just smoking pot was associated with an 89 percent higher risk of
unsafe sex for women, while drinking alone was tied to more than
double the risk.
Men this age didn't appear much more likely to have unprotected sex
when they used either alcohol or marijuana alone.
When men used both substances on the same day, however, they were 71
percent more likely to have unsafe sex than on days when they didn't
use either one.
Unprotected sex - intercourse without a condom - has long been
linked independently to both drinking and drug use, the study team
notes in the American Journal on Addictions. But the current results
offer fresh evidence that combining these substances may be riskier
for women than for men.
The researchers examined survey data from 290 young adults on
alcohol use, marijuana use and condomless vaginal intercourse with
an opposite-sex partner in the past 90 days.
They recruited participants who had previously used alcohol or
marijuana by adverting on Facebook, Craigslist, radio stations,
public transportation and in college newspapers. Researchers
interviewed participants in person and offered compensation of $40
and free testing for sexually transmitted infections (STIs).
Adults who joined the study were 21 years old on average, and more
than half were enrolled in school.
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Over the previous three months, participants reported using alcohol
an average of 24 days and marijuana an average of 41 days. They used
both substances together on an average of 13 days.
During that same period, they had unprotected sex on an average of
20 days.
Men and women reported similar rates of unprotected sex, but men
drank and used marijuana more often alone and in combination.
One limitation of the study is that researchers lacked data to
explain why people drank, smoked pot, or had unprotected sex.
Researchers also didn't know whether people were having unprotected
sex in the context of committed relationships or with multiple
partners during the three-month study period.
By focusing only on opposite-sex couples having vaginal intercourse,
researchers also didn't have a complete picture of how all young
adults might behave after drinking or smoking pot.
These young adults may have also come of age during a period of
limited sex education in schools, which might have made them more
likely to engage in unprotected sex than some older adults, noted
Christian Joyal, a psychology researcher at the University of Quebec
at Trois-Rivieres in Canada who wasn't involved in the study.
"When sexual education was mandatory at school, younger educated
people were at lower risks for unprotected sex compared with single
baby boomers," Joyal said by email. "Now, the trend might
unfortunately be reversed. Today, internet pornography is the main
source of information for sexual practices and protected sex is rare
in porn."
SOURCE: https://bit.ly/2muIqpH American Journal on Addictions,
online June 20, 2018.
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