Let's Talk about Sex, Maybe: Interviewers, Respondents, and Sexual Behavior Reporting in Rural South Africa

Brian Houle; Nicole Angotti; Samuel J Clark; Jill Williams; F Xavier Gómez-Olivé; Jane Menken; Chodziwadziwa Kabudula; Kerstin Klipstein-Grobusch; Stephen M Tollman

doi:10.1177/1525822X15595343

Let's Talk about Sex, Maybe: Interviewers, Respondents, and Sexual Behavior Reporting in Rural South Africa

Field methods. 2016;28(2):112-132. doi: 10.1177/1525822X15595343. Epub 2015 Aug 13.

Authors

Brian Houle¹, Nicole Angotti², Samuel J Clark³, Jill Williams⁴, F Xavier Gómez-Olivé⁵, Jane Menken⁴, Chodziwadziwa Kabudula⁵, Kerstin Klipstein-Grobusch⁶, Stephen M Tollman⁷

Affiliations

¹ Australian Demographic and Social Research Institute, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia; Population Program, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado, Boulder, USA.
² Population Program, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado, Boulder, USA; Department of Sociology and Center on Health, Risk and Society, American University, Washington DC, USA; MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
³ MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa; University of Washington, USA; INDEPTH Network, Accra, Ghana.
⁴ Population Program, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado, Boulder, USA; MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
⁵ MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa.
⁶ MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa; Global Health Unit, Julius Center for Health Sciences and Primary Care, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht University, Netherlands.
⁷ MRC/Wits Rural Public Health and Health Transitions Research Unit, School of Public Health, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa; Centre for Global Health Research, Umea University, Sweden; INDEPTH Network, Accra, Ghana.

Abstract

Researchers are often skeptical of sexual behavior surveys: respondents may lie or forget details of their intimate lives, and interviewers may exercise authority in how they capture responses. We use data from a 2010-2011 cross-sectional sexual behavior survey in rural South Africa to explore who says what to whom about their sexual lives. Results show an effect of fieldworker age across outcomes -- respondents report "safer", more "responsible" sexual behavior to older fieldworkers; and an effect of fieldworker sex -- men report more sexual partners to female fieldworkers. Understanding fieldworker effects on the production of sexual behavior survey data serves methodological and analytical goals.

Abstract

Grants and funding