Talking About Safe Sex: The Role of Expectations and Experience1

We examined how affective expectations and objective experience influenced female college students' (N = 69) evaluations of discussions o f safe-sex practices and willingness to engage in future discussions. Participants interacted with a confident male confederate (positive experience) or a nervous one (negative experience). Positive experiences produced more positive evaluations and greater willingness to participate in the future. Expectations were manipulated after the discussion by telling participants that discussions became easier over time (positive expectations) or telling participants nothing (neutral expectations). Independent o f experience, positive expectations also resulted in more positive evaluations and greater willingness. Similar results were obtained 2 weeks later. Findings are discussed in terms o f previous studies o f affective expectations and implications for safe-sex education programs.