It is widely recognized that current HIV intervention models are falling short of their goals. What are the alternatives?To answer this question, New International Directions in HIV Prevention for Gay and Bisexual Men presents a collection of articles from European and American authors that rival dominant paradigms of HIV prevention. Researchers, practitioners, and community organizations will be challenged to examine current assumptions and to consider neglected aspects of risk behavior such as love, trust, and the dynamics of sexual intimacy. New International Directions in HIV Prevention for Gay and Bisexual Men explores models and theories that will help you develop more effective HIV prevention programs to better serve patients and clients.New International Directions in HIV Prevention for Gay and Bisexual Men offers you fresh perspectives on prevention work by examining risk behaviors in the interactional, communal, and social contexts in which they are practiced. You will receive alternative explanations and reasons for HIV risk that go beyond current approaches and that introduce possibilities for new intervention strategies. Written by experts in the field, the chapters in New International Directions in HIV Prevention for Gay and Bisexual Men will give you insight into new ideas and developments, including: placing a greater emphasis on improving successful risk management strategies as opposed to quantifying risk factors examining the meaning and context of sexual acts which occur in casual encounters or steady partnerships and incorporating their relevancy into prevention work considering the effects that cultural context and socially constructed meanings have on prevention work and incorporating individuals’values and feelings into prevention strategies focusing on more realistic goals of harm reduction that take sexual decision making into consideration as opposed to expecting abstinence relating the various aspects of sexual encounters--physical attraction, intimacy, reciprocity, and power--to reasons why men choose not to use condomsExamining how gay men can underestimate the risk of HIV in order to meet needs of intimacy, New International Directions in HIV Prevention for Gay and Bisexual Men will help you understand the symbolic dimension of sexual contact. The normal, everyday reasons for having sex without a condom are explored, questioning models which often characterize unprotected sex as being the result of low self-esteem, substance abuse, or some other psychological vulnerability. Presenting data from both qualitative and quantitative research conducted at group and individual levels, this book reveals the complexity of risk behavior, the richness of sexual experience, and the importance of respecting the unique context in which gay men live their sexual lives. New International Directions in HIV Prevention for Gay and Bisexual Men will help you understand this point of view, enabling you to provide patients and clients with more effective HIV prevention and risk management services.

This innovative collection offers a wide-ranging palette of psychological, public health, and sociopolitical approaches toward addressing the multi-level prevention needs of gay men living with HIV and AIDS. This book advances our understanding of comprehensive health care, risk and preventive behaviors, sources of mental distress and resilience, treatment adherence, and the experiences of gay men’s communities such as communities of color, youth, faith communities, and the house ball community. Interventions span biomedical, behavioral, structural, and technological approaches toward critical goals, including bolstering the immune system, promoting safer sexual practices, reducing HIV-related stigma and discrimination, and eliminating barriers to care. The emphasis throughout these diverse chapters is on evidence-based, client-centered practice, coordination of care, and inclusive, culturally responsive services. Included in the coverage: Comprehensive primary health care for HIV positive gay men From pathology to resiliency: understanding the mental health of HIV positive gay men Emerging and innovative prevention strategies for HIV positive gay men Understanding the developmental and psychosocial needs of HIV positive gay adolescent males Social networks of HIV positive gay men: their role and importance in HIV prevention HIV positive gay men, health care, legal rights, and policy issues Understanding Prevention for HIV Positive Gay Men will interest academics, researchers, prevention experts, practitioners, and policymakers in public health. It will also be important to research organizations, nonprofit organizations, and clinical agencies, as well as graduate programs related to public health, consultation, and advocacy.

Go beyond the statistics to discover why many gay and bisexual men take the health risk—and what can be done about it The rate of new HIV diagnoses and other sexually transmitted infections among men having sex with men has increased sharply, especially in men of color. Barebacking: Psychosocial and Public Health Approaches examines in depth the reasons why so many gay and bisexual men indulge in “barebacking,” or intentional unprotected sex. Respected experts reveal the latest studies that explore every facet of this alarming trend that apparently began as a phenomenon confined to those who had already been infected. The mounting likelihood of a renewed epidemic is a troubling public health issue that reaches beyond gays and bisexuals into the heterosexual community. The aim of Barebacking: Psychosocial and Public Health Approaches is to provide clinicians with some insights to foster strategies for addressing these unsafe sexual behaviors. This book presents the studies of researchers working in the field as well as those who can provide both research and clinical perspectives. Thoroughly researched and richly referenced, this book is an essential resource for health and mental health professionals. In Barebacking: Psychosocial and Public Health Approaches, you’ll find discussion and research on: the public health perspective of the emergence of barebacking among gay and bisexual men how the term “barebacking” differs between various gay and bisexual men how club drug use has posed a public health threat HIV transmission risks among men who meet through the Internet barebacking among Internet-based male sex workers assessing HIV-negative gay or bisexual men a treatment model for barebackers psychotherapy considerations for individual gay men and male couples having unsafe sex Barebacking: Psychosocial and Public Health Approaches is an insightful and comprehensive research source, essential for psychologists, researchers, public health officials, counselors, psychotherapists, and anyone concerned with the HIV epidemic in the United States.