Researching Sexual Behavior.

Researching Sexual Behavior. Edited by John Bancroft. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1997, 461 pages. Cloth, $49.95.

Reviewed by Bernard E. Whitley, Jr., Ph.D., Ball State University, Department of Psychological Science, Muncie, IN 47306; e-mail: [e-mail]

When I first saw the title of this book, I thought, "It's finally here: A book that addresses the problems of conducting research on human sexuality!" Unfortunately, that's not exactly what it turned out to be. Rather than the inroad discussion of methodological issues that I expected from its title, this book is a collection of papers presented at a meeting held at the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction in April, 1996, to discuss methodological issues in the use of large-scale survey research to study sexual behavior. In addition to the papers, it includes transcripts of discussions of the papers by the participants in the meeting and a few post-meeting papers written to address some of the issues raised in those discussions. Consequently, this hook will probably be of more interest to people using or intending to use survey research to study sexual behavior than to sexuality researchers in general.

Rather than setting a structured agenda, the organizers of the meeting appear to have asked the participants to address whatever issues they considered to be important to survey research on sexuality. As a result, the papers in the book range widely in both topic and scope, from overviews of the history and current status of sexuality research in the United States and in world-wide perspective to two studies of the correlation between diary records and retrospective self-reports of sexual activity. Bancroft has organized the 26 papers around 10 themes: linking research to policy, methodology for the individual, methodology in specific contexts, change in behavior over time, retrospective versus daily assessment, participation bias, researching social networks, researching sexual interactions, concluding comments, and post-conference papers.

The unstructured approach to the meeting's agenda led to a book that has both strengths and shortcomings. On the positive side, in addition to the traditional survey methodology issues the low level of structure allowed participants to address the benefits of a number of less commonly used approaches to the study of sexual behavior, such as the analysis of individuals' narratives or stories about their sexual experiences, the use of network analysis to identify patterns of sexual interactions within communities, the study of romantic dyads, and the use of ethnographic methods in the study of sexual behavior. Another strength of the book is the inclusion of transcripts of the participants' discussions of the papers. These transcripts provide additional insight into the topics under discussion and frequently point out gaps in our knowledge of sexual behavior and the best ways to study it. On the negative side, the lack of structure resulted in some of the chapters having redundant aspects, a lack of a clear narrative flow from chapter to chapter, and little integration across chapters. I frequently found myself wishing that the book had been more aggressively edited to produce fewer chapters and a volume better integrated both within and across chapters.

Nonetheless, as one who is interested in sexuality research but has little background in survey methodology, I found the book very informative about the problems involved in survey research on human sexuality. Although many of the problems discussed, such as obtaining representative samples from the desired population and the effects of question wording on responses, are familiar to those who have taken a course in research methods, the chapters illustrate how these problems are intensified when such a personally and socially sensitive issue as sexual behavior is the focus of the survey. The papers also discuss a number of potential solutions to these problems, such as computer-assisted interviewing and factors to consider when writing questions, constructing questionnaires, and selecting and training interviewers. The lesson to be learned from these papers is clear: Unless you are experienced both in survey research in general and sexuality-related survey research in particular, don't try to conduct a large scale sexuality survey on your own; contract with an experienced survey research organization both to help you design your questionnaire and to administer the survey.

Some of the chapters also address issues that extend beyond survey research to sexuality research in general. A few of these issues, such as the validity of self-reports and the problems of classifying people as homosexual, bisexual, or heterosexual for research purposes, have been discussed frequently. However, other chapters highlight issues that deserve more attention if sexuality research is to progress methodologically. These issues include the development of a model for teaching sexuality research as an interdisciplinary endeavor, the integration of qualitative and quantitative approaches to research, and the importance of theory and theory-driven research as complements to the more common problem-driven approach to studying sexuality. Because of the book's focus on survey research, these topics are discussed only briefly; a volume dedicated to these and other conceptual and theoretical issues would be a useful addition to the literature on sexuality research.

Another set of papers that I found particularly interesting discussed cultural issues in the study of sexuality. These papers focused not only on the problems of constructing surveys to elicit complete and valid responses across the racial/ethnic categories used in American research, but also on the problems brought about by the use of such categories, particularly lumping quite culturally diverse groups together as "Hispanic." Another issue emphasized in the book is the importance of studying sexuality in countries other than those that comprise the developed world. Although this issue does not seem to receive much attention in the United States, the importance of understanding the sexual mores and behavior of cultural groups from these areas will grow as the world becomes more interconnected.

In summary, this book provides a rather detailed discussion of a number of issues related to the use of large-scale survey research to study sexual behavior, with some chapters that are also relevant to sexuality research in general. Because of the increasing use of surveys in sexuality research, the book should be part of the collection of institutional libraries as a resource for researchers and students; however, it would probably be appropriate only for the personal libraries of sexuality researchers who have a particular interest in survey methodology.

Michael R. Steveson, Ph.D.

Department of Psychological Sciences Ball State University Muncie, IN 47306, USA