Homosexual/Bisexual Men’s HIV or Sexually Transmitted Infection and Their Heterosexual Wives’ Remarriage in China

ABSTRACT

An emerging social issue engrossing research involves heterosexual wives of homosexual/bisexual men (tongqi in Chinese). These wives often marry without knowing their husbands’ homosexuality. When realizing their husbands’ HIV or sexually transmitted infection, the wives are likely to substitute for their husbands by remarrying. Meanwhile, homosexual husbands are likely to substitute for their remarrying wives and contract HIV or sexually transmitted infection. To substantiate these likelihoods, a survey of 39 tongqi provided event history data to investigate relationships between the husband’s infection and the wife’s remarrying. Results supported the hypotheses that the wife’s knowing her husband’s HIV or sexually transmitted infection predominantly predicted her remarrying, and the wife’s remarrying predicted her knowing her husband’s HIV or sexually transmitted infection. These results imply assisting the remarrying of the wife of the man with HIV or sexually transmitted infection and preventing the man’s sexually transmitted infection after his wife’s remarriage.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the General Research Fund, Hong Kong [9043098].

Notes on contributors

Chau-kiu Cheung

Chau-kiu Cheung, Ph.D., is an associate professor at the City University of Hong Kong, China. He has recently published research results concerning civility, social inclusion, resilience, character education, moral development, emerging adulthood, peer influence, and class mobility. His current research addresses issues of protest, thriving, early child development, organizational culture, and drug and vocational rehabilitation.

Eileen Yuk-ha Tsang

Eileen Yuk-ha Tsang, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the City University of Hong Kong. Her research interest includes cultural and political sociology of China’s emerging middle class, the sociology of gender and sexuality, sociology of consumption and popular culture, sociology of sex work, and migration, labor, and crime.