‘It's just a matter of playing the odds’: Navigating risks associated with sexual behaviour in the COVID‐19 era

Abstract

Since the outbreak of the COVID‐19 pandemic, scholars and popular media outlets have been speculating on the pandemic's effects on sexual relationships. While research differs as to whether COVID‐19 is associated with sexual behaviour changes, none has focused on how sexual risk‐taking during the pandemic is perceived and accomplished. Drawing on semi‐structured interview data collected from 30 sexual minority men in the US, this study explores how men make sense of and manage risk during sexual activity taking place outside the bounds of lockdown. Four themes arose from these interviews: (a) the commonality of sexual activity despite COVID‐19 risk; (b) sexual motivations rooted in emotions such as desire, longing for connection, and the wish to live fully in the face of the pandemic; (c) varied perceptions regarding the possibility of preventing COVID‐19 infection; and (d) risk assessment and management strategies that were similar to those used for HIV prevention. Assuming or calling for abstinence neglects questions of risk navigation and omits the experiences of large swaths of the population. Addressing these issues might minimize COVID‐19 transmission associated with sexual risk‐taking among sexual minority men.

Love in the Time of COVID-19: The Social Dimensions of Intimate Life under Lockdown

“…Whether measuring changes in relationship-anchored sex or examining the ways individuals sought new romantic and erotic ties during lockdown, individual sexual behavior involved a series of emotional and intellectual calculations. The heightened emotional frequency of the moment, combined with a near universal need for interpersonal connection provoked many people to seek out new sexual ties, even in the face of bodily risk ( Braksmajer and Cserni 2021 ). Although analyses of coupled sexuality treated it as part of the holistic universe of domestic life, studies of sex and relationship seeking had a near epidemiological approach, foregrounding sexual risk, and using HIV as a paradigm for thinking about sex during COVID ( Eaton and Kalichman 2020 ; Garcia-Iglesias and Ledin 2021 ).…”