Development and Validation of the Sexual and Negative Dating Inventory (SANDI): A Measure of Dating and Sexual Protective Behaviors

ABSTRACT

Adverse sexual experiences are highly prevalent among college students and associated with increased mental health symptoms and decreased use of protective behavioral strategies (PBS). The current study developed and validated a measure of dating and sexual PBS: the Sexual and Negative Dating Inventory (SANDI). Participants (64.28% female, 19.59 [2.90 SD] years old, 68.90% non-Hispanic, 71.42% white, and 76.06% heterosexual) responded to baseline (n = 1,298) and one-month (n = 336) surveys. Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling identified a 24-item measure with five-factors: Location Sharing, Assertiveness, Self-Protection, Risk Reduction, and Privacy. The model revealed good fit: χ²(242) = 2115.52, p < .001, CFI = .977, RMSEA = .077 (90% CI = .074, .080), SRMR = .043. Test-retest reliability revealed acceptable reliability of 0.74 at follow-up. Overall, SANDI showed acceptable reliability and adequate convergent and discriminant validity among college students.

KEYWORDS:

• College students
• protective behavioral strategies
• sexual violence
• regretted sex
• measurement development

Acknowledgments

This manuscript is dedicated to Robert Christopher Wilson, NKFD Private #199.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethical standards and informed consent

All procedures followed were in accordance with the ethical standards of the responsible committee on human experimentation [institutional and national] and with the Helsinki Declaration of 1975, as revised in 2000. Informed consent was obtained from all patients for being included in the study.

Additional information

Funding

The study was supported in part by the University of Central Florida Doctoral Research Support Award as awarded to the first author.

Notes on contributors

Roselyn Peterson

Roselyn Peterson, Ph.D., is a NIAAA-funded T32 Postdoctoral Fellow at the Brown University Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies. Dr. Peterson’s research focuses on the associations between sexual violence and alcohol use, with a specific focus on protective behavioral strategies targeting both sexual behaviors and alcohol use.

Robert D. Dvorak

Robert D. Dvorak, Ph.D., ABPP, is a Professor in Clinical Psychology at the University of Central Florida. He is the director of the Risk, Eating & Addiction Longitudinally Examined Through In situ Momentary Experiences (REALE-TIME) lab. His research focuses on health-risk behavior through the lens of cognitive, emotional, and behavioral self-regulation.

Ardhys N. De Leon

Ardhys De Leon, M.S., is a doctoral candidate in the clinical psychology doctoral program at the University of Central Florida. Ardhys’ research focuses on the factors that contribute to the development and maintenance of hazardous drinking about minoritized and at-risk populations, with a specific focus on sociocultural factors among Hispanic/Latinx drinkers.

Angelina V. Leary

Angelina V. Leary, M.S., is a doctoral candidate in the clinical psychology doctoral program at the University of Central Florida. Her research focuses primarily on health psychology including the use of substances and impacts of long-term health impacts.

Emily K. Burr

Emily K. Burr, M.S., is a doctoral candidate of Clinical Psychology at the University of Central Florida. Her primary research focus is on vulnerabilities that contribute to maladaptive self-regulation strategies and behavioral outcomes.

Lidia Meshesha

Lidia Meshesha, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Clinical Psychology Program at UCF. Dr. Meshesha’s research interests include: behavioral interventions for addiction focusing on increasing alternative rewards and the use of behavioral economic theory to understand etiology, maintenance, and treatment of addiction.

Jacqueline Woerner

Jacqueline Woerner, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Departments of Sociology and Psychology at the University of Central Florida. Dr. Woerner’s core research areas are in the prevention of and response to gender-based violence, especially as it relates to engagement in health risk behaviors, such as problem substance use and sexual risk behavior.

Catherine Kaukinen

Catherine Kaukinen, Ph.D., is Dean of the Norman J. Radow College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Kennesaw State University. Her primary areas of research interest include examining aspects of violence against women, such as the long-term consequences of the violence; victim coping, resilience and decision-making; the history of Title IX and federal initiatives to address violence against college women; and the evaluation of campus-based prevention and intervention programs.