Marijuana use and undetectable HIV viral load in persons living with HIV in Florida

Aims: Sexual violence towardsmen bywomen has been grossly understudied in the literature. Moreover, the tactics used to force sex amongmen is virtually unknown. The aimswere to investigate: (1) the tactics used to force men to have sex and (2) the role of substance use on forced sex and the tactics employed. Methods: I used data from the National Survey for Family Growth (2006–2010) to investigate the association between forced sex and substance use among men who reported forced sex by a woman and the association between tactic used during the sexual attack and substance use in the last year. Six tactics were ranked according to force exhorted: given drugs/alcohol, bigger/older, threats to relationship, threaten physical harm, held down, physically hurt. The analytic sample was 8,108 and I used logistic regression to test the hypotheses. Results: Five percent of men (N=501) reported forced sex by a woman. The top 3 tactics endorsed were verbal pressure (69%), given drugs/alcohol (38%), and being held down (32%). Results indicate a difference in rates of marijuana use (p=0.02), crack use (p<0.001), crystal meth use (p<0.001) and a marginal difference for binge drinking (p=0.058) between men who reported forced sex and those who did not. Being given drugs or alcohol as a means of forced sex was associated with binge drinking (OR=1.76) and cocaine use (OR=3.04). Being held downwas associated withmarijuana (OR=2.04) and cocaine use (OR=2.89). Conclusions: Men who reported forced sex had higher rates of substance use compared to men with no forced sex history. Although substance use was associated with force tactics at statistically significant levels, a clear trend of stronger tactics being associatedwith substanceusewasnot observed. Longitudinal analysis of sexual practices should be conducted to better understand the role of alcohol/drug consumption preceding a forced sex event and to examine whether there is a cycle in which substance use increases risk of future sexual violence and thus violence increases risk of substance use among men. Financial support: 5T32DA00727222.