By
Brett Erickson
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Sexual activity not as rampant as many students believe, Campus Health official says
Reality is not always what perception would indicate.
At least, this is the philosophy of University of Arizona Campus Health Center officials regarding sexual activity on campus.
"Students think, 'Everybody's getting more and getting it better than I am," said Lee Ann Hamilton, a health educator for the Campus Health Center.
This idea, Hamilton said, often leads students to believe that their peers are more sexually active than themselves. But the actual numbers related to the issue are often met with surprise from students, she said.
According to the center's Wellness 1999 survey of 1,766 UA students, 76 percent of all respondents said they had been with no or one sexual partners the previous year. In addition, only 12 percent reported having three or more partners, a statistic that proves students are being responsible about their decisions, Hamilton said.
No data was available from previous surveys, but Hamilton said she has noticed the increase in student responsibility.
"People are being more careful of who they get naked and sleep with," she said. "Our students are much less sexually active than almost anybody thinks."
Growing up in a generation with HIV, AIDS and other sexually related risks has been one of the major factors in the new, cautious attitude among college students, Hamilton added.
Another sign that campus health officials said indicates a decline in sexual activity is that 27 percent of the surveyed students reported being virgins. Hamilton said that figure is higher than it was in the early 1990s, although she didn't have the exact data. Campus Health began conducting the survey in 1995 after receiving a federal grant to investigate similar issues on campus.
Members of the UA's homosexual community are also becoming safer in their sexual activities, ASUA Pride Alliance Director Kira Mauro said. In past decades, gays and lesbians have focused their attention solely on preventing HIV and AIDS. Now, however, as people have learned more about other sexually transmitted diseases, the attention has shifted towards all sex-related health issues.
A second trend Mauro said is prevalent in the gay community is another shift in attention. People are practicing less "direct contact" sex - where diseases are most easily transmitted - and instead focusing on non-penetrative activities, Mauro said.
"Sexual activity has become more safe in the gay and lesbian community over the years," said Mauro, a linguistics graduate student.
Robert Svob, the UA dean of students from 1966 to1986, said although he has not had the opportunity to observe the new generation of college students, he imagines their lifestyles are similar to the students from his era.
"The students in my day were students - they came to college, they came to have fun, and they did," he said.
During his tenure, Svob said they weren't overly concerned about sexual activity getting out of hand, although they did do a few things to make it hard for students to have an intimate moment on campus. One method they used as a form of "birth control" was to flood the lawns at night so students could not lie down on the grass.
And, although many UA students might believe similar encounters still exist today, Hamilton said it is still often a matter of story telling and bragging.
"It's a huge misperception."
