Sugar Dating, Perceptions of Power, and Condom Use: Comparing the Sexual Health Risk Behaviours of Sugar Dating to Non-Sugar Dating Women

ABSTRACT

Sugar dating is a form of dating typically characterized by wealthier, older men providing financial support to younger, less financially secure women in exchange for companionship and sexual intimacy. The goals of the current study were to (1) quantitatively assess the sexual practices of sugar dating women in their arrangements with sugar daddies, including time spent on sexual activity, average number of current partners, and relative perceptions of relationship power, (2) examine how perceptions of power within arrangements relate to condom use with sugar daddies, and (3) compare samples of sugar dating and non-sugar dating women on both condom use consistency by partner type and rates of STI testing and diagnoses. Overall, condom use for all women was highest with casual sexual partners and lowest with romantic partners, with sugar dating women’s condom use with sugar daddies in between. Consistent with social exchange theory, perception of power within sugar dating arrangements predicted condom use with sugar daddies, such that women who felt they held more power reported more consistent condom use. Further, sugar dating women were twice as likely to have been diagnosed with an STI but were more than six times as likely to have been tested for STIs.

Notes

¹ Responses assessing consistency of condom use were as follows: Sugar-dating sample, n = 64 for casual partners, n = 54 for romantic, and n = 44 for sugar daddy. Among non-sugar dating women, n = 202 for casual partners and n = 208 for romantic partners.

² We performed additional analyses comparing condom use during intercourse with men (for all partner types) based on participants’ sexual identity (heterosexual versus non-heterosexual). Results indicated no meaningful differences in condom use based on participants’ sexual identity for romantic partners, t(260) = −.72, p = .475; casual partners, t(264) = −1.49, p = .137; or sugar daddies, t(42) = −.1.59, p = .119. These analyses were also performed for STI comparisons (see footnote 4).

³ Confidence intervals reported for STI comparisons are for the odds ratio values.

⁴ There was no association between participants’ sexual identity and having been tested for an STI, χ2 (1) = 2.38, p = .10, φ = .09, with 72.2% of heterosexual/mostly heterosexual and 63.6% of non-heterosexual women having been tested. However, heterosexual/mostly heterosexual women were more likely to have been diagnosed as having an STI (26.9%) than non-heterosexual women (10.3%), χ2 (1) = 9.50, p = .002, φ = .22, OR = 3.67, 95% CI [1.55, 8.71].