Sexual Self-Concept After Child Maltreatment: The Role of Resilient Coping and Sexual Experience Among U.S. Young Adults.

Autor: Fava NM; School of Social Work, Robert Stempel College of Public Health & Social Work, Center for Children and Families, Florida International University, AHC-5, Room 587, 11200 SW 8th Street, Miami, FL, 33199, USA. nfava@fiu.edu., Coxe SJ; Department of Psychology, Center for Children and Families, Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA., Fortenberry JD; School of Medicine, Indiana University, Indianapolis, IN, USA., Bay-Cheng LY; Psychology Department, LaMarsh Centre for Child & Youth Research, York University, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Archives of sexual behavior [Arch Sex Behav] 2024 Jan; Vol. 53 (1), pp. 359-373. Date of Electronic Publication: 2023 Oct 17.
DOI: 10.1007/s10508-023-02706-3
Abstrakt: Evidence supports sexual experience as normative and health-promoting for many, but this picture is less clear for people with histories of adversity. Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) was used to garner data from a sample of 362 young adults (aged 18-25) wherein 44.5% (n = 161) identified as women. We assessed longitudinal associations between child maltreatment and sexual self-concept, as mediated by sexual behaviors and sexual partners, and whether resilient coping moderated these associations using structural equation modeling. Although both child maltreatment and resilient coping were directly associated with aspects of sexual experience, only resilient coping was directly associated with sexual self-concept. In addition, we found support for sexual experience as a mediator between child maltreatment/resilient coping and sexual self-concept. Specifically, cumulative maltreatment was associated with more sexual partners, which was associated with higher sexual self-monitoring. Resilient coping was associated with more sexual partners and more sexual behaviors, which was associated with higher sexual self-monitoring and higher sexual self-consciousness, sexual assertiveness, sexual self-esteem, and sexual motivation, respectively. Thus, sexual behaviors and sexual partners operated independently. Findings contrast messaging that sexual experience is universally risky regardless of maltreatment history. Rather, sexual experience may foster positive sexual self-concept for some. Sexual health advocates must attend to differences between sexual behaviors and sexual partners in relation to sexual well-being, and support resilience in the sexual domain.
(© 2023. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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