Sociosexuality and Sex with New Partners: Indirect Effects via Drinking at Parties and Bars

Hone, Liana S. E., Maria Testa, and Weijun Wang. 2019. “Sociosexuality and Sex with New Partners: Indirect Effects via Drinking at Parties and Bars.” PsyArXiv. November 14. doi:10.31234/osf.io/3nvce

Abstract
Objective: The desire for many novel, concurrent, uncommitted, sex partners (i.e., unrestricted sociosexuality) may encourage individuals to seek out contexts that facilitate casual sex. We tested a model in which the effects of sociosexuality on sex with new partners were mediated via drinking in specific contexts. We hypothesized that drinking at parties and bars, which are known to facilitate casual sex (but not drinking at home) would contribute to sex with new (but not with previous) partners.

Method: Participants were 427 freshmen men from a large, public, Northeastern university. They completed a baseline survey in their first semester followed by 56 days of daily reports on drinking and sexual activity during their second semester.

Results: As predicted, sociosexuality measured at baseline positively predicted occasions of sex with a new partner, but not sex with a previous partner. In support of the model, effects were partially mediated by frequency of drinking at parties and bars across the 56-day reporting period, but not by drinking at home.

Conclusions: Previous research has demonstrated associations among sociosexuality, drinking, and casual sex. Our study is unique in suggesting that drinking in specific contexts—that is, drinking at parties and bars, but not drinking at home—partially mediates the effects of sociosexuality on sex with new partners. This pathway suggests that men with a desire for many novel, concurrent, uncommitted, sex partners seek out drinking contexts as a way of facilitating these encounters.


Discussion

Consistent with hypotheses, college men higher in sociosexuality reported more occasions of sex with new partners—but not more occasions of sex with previous partners—over a 56-day period. We proposed that this relationship would be mediated via more frequent occasions of drinking at parties and bars, context that provide opportunities to meet new sexual partners. Recent studies have suggested that sociosexuality predicts drinking frequency because individuals with unrestricted sociosexual orientations seek out drinking contexts that facilitate casual sex (Cleveland et al., 2019; Hone et al., 2013; Testa and Hone, 2019). However, to date, no study has directly tested whether specific drinking contexts mediate the relationship between sociosexuality and sex with new partners. Using aggregated daily reports from more than 400 college freshman men, the model was supported: Men high in sociosexuality at baseline assessment engaged in more occasions of drinking at parties and bars over a subsequent 56-day daily reporting period, which positively predicted engaging in sex with new (but not previous) partners during that period. The present study is unique in showing that the effect is specific to drinking at parties and bars. Sociosexuality did not predict more drinking at home, a context which presumably provides less access to new sex partners, and drinking at home did not mediate the effect of sociosexuality on sex with new partners. Although not expected, men who reported more occasions of drinking at home reported more occasions of sex with previous partners. It is possible that this relationship reflects event-specific use of alcohol as an aphrodisiac or facilitator of intimacy within established relationships (George and Stoner, 2000) or it may simply reflect drinking patterns among men in relationships.

The study adds to a growing body of literature on the importance of considering specific drinking contexts—and not just drinking—in understanding sexual outcomes (Bersamin et al., 2012; Cleveland et al., 2019; Mair et al., 2016; Testa and Cleveland, 2017). For example, frequency of attendance at parties and bars mediated the relationship between sociosexuality and perpetration of sexual aggression (Cleveland et al., 2019). Our findings suggest that the desire to have sex with new partners among men high in sociosexuality may drive this relationship, and indeed sexual events involving new partners include more sexually aggressive tactics than do events with previous partners (Testa et al., 2015). Party and bar drinking contexts may function as “hotspots” contributing to sexually aggressive activity and hence as a worthy target for prevention efforts. Moreover, men high in sociosexuality are a worthy target for alcohol and sexual aggression intervention efforts, given their motivation to drink in social contexts and to engage in sex with new partners. It is important for college drinking intervention efforts to recognize these important motivations, which may interfere with efforts to limit drinking (Hone et al., 2013).

Although we found support for our hypothesized indirect effects model, we also found positive effects of drinking events at home on number of occasions of sex with previous partners, which comprise the majority of sex events. Although not hypothesized, findings are consistent with prior reports of a positive relationship between alcohol and various measures of sexual activity within adolescent samples (Claxton et al., 2015). While it is tempting to interpret findings at the event level (e.g., drinking at parties and bars increases likelihood of sex with new partner later that day), our model tests between-participant relationships, indicating that men who are motivated to have sex with new partners indeed do report more sexual events with new partners, and that the relationship is at least partially explained by a greater number of occasions of drinking at parties and bars. Earlier multilevel analyses of these data at the daily event level revealed that at the within-person level, drinking events (context unspecified) increased the likelihood of sex with a new partner in the next four hours but decreased the likelihood of sex with a previous partner (Testa et al., 2015). However, these effects were obtained after accounting for the positive between-participant effects of number of drinking events on both sex with new and sex with previous partners: that is, men who drank more frequently also had more sex.