Sameness and Difference in Psychological Research on Consensually Non-Monogamous Relationships: The Need for Invariance and Equivalence Testing.

Comparative research involving consensually non-monogamous (CNM) relationships and outcomes related to well-being continues to grow as an area of interest within sexual science. However, claims of sameness and/or difference between groups rely on two critical, yet widely under-appreciated assumptions: that the concepts being compared between groups are the same (i.e., measurement invariance), and that logically and statistically coherent procedures are used for evaluating sameness (i.e., equivalence testing). We evaluated the state of measurement invariance and equivalence across three studies, involving different types of CNM comparisons (i.e., relationship types, partner types) and designs (analysis of primary individual data, primary dyadic data, and secondary data). Our invariance tests of CNM compared to monogamous individuals (Study 1) and "primary" compared to "secondary" partners in dyadic appraisal of CNM individuals (Study 2) revealed that many measures of well-being failed to replicate their measurement models and were not generalizable across relationship types or partner types. Our reanalyses of existing comparative CNM effects using individual and meta-analyzed equivalence tests (Study 3), meanwhile, indicated that this literature requires more consistent reporting practices and larger samples, as most studies produced uninformative tests of equivalence. Our results illustrate the importance of auxiliary hypothesis evaluation and statistical procedure selection for generating informative comparative tests. Our findings also highlight potential divergences in social construction of well-being. We offer suggestions for researchers, reviewers, and editors in terms of needed methodological reforms for future comparative CNM research.

Arousability as a predictor of sexual risk behaviours in African-American adolescent women.

This study examined the impact of sexual excitation (arousability) on sexual risk-taking behaviours in a community sample of African-American adolescent women. A sample of 701 African-American adolescent women completed measures examining their propensity for sexual arousal, impulsivity and sexual behaviour. Compared with women with a lower propensity for sexual arousability, women with a higher propensity reported a greater number of sexual partners, more inconsistent condom use, a greater likelihood of having engaged in sexual intercourse with 'risky' partners, and sex while high on alcohol or drugs. These results indicate that women who have a greater propensity to become sexually aroused in a variety of situations may be at a greater risk for contracting HIV or sexually transmissible infections relative to women with a lower propensity for arousal. This suggests that individual differences in the propensity to become sexually aroused should be considered when developing intervention approaches targeting young African-American women.