Where the Boys Are: Sexual Expectations and Behaviour among Young Women on Holiday

Author(s): Kathleen Ragsdale, Wayne Difranceisco and Steven D. Pinkerton

Source: Culture, Health & Sexuality, Vol. 8, No. 2 (Mar. - Apr., 2006), pp. 85-98
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
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Culture, Health & Sexuality, March-April

RRoutledge

2006; 8(2): 85-98

Taylor&FrancisGroup

Where the boys are: Sexual expectations

among -young women on holiday

and behaviour

KATHLEEN RAGSDALE1, WAYNE DIFRANCEISCO2 &

STEVEN D. PINKERTON2
'Medical and Health Research Association of New York City, Inc. (MHRA) and the National
Development and Research Institutes (NDRI), NY, USA, and 2Center for AIDS Intervention
Research (CAIR), Medical College of Wisconsin, WI, USA

Abstract
The main objectives of this study were to examine relationships between vacation sex expectations
and travelling companionship type (solo, paired, or group), and behavioural outcomes such as
engaging in a relationship while on vacation, procuring condoms, and initiating condom use with
vacation sex partners among tourist women in Costa Rica. A brief interview was used to assess
sociodemographic characteristics, vacation sex expectations and relationships, casual sex variables,
and alcohol use among a convenience sample of 128 single female tourists 18 years of age or older.
Univariate and multivariate analysis were used to examine relationships among variables of interest.
Women who travelled solo or with a single female companion and women who anticipated having sex
on holiday were more likely than other tourist women to report one or more vacation relationships, to
have procured condoms, and to have initiated condom use with a vacation sex partner. Women who
engage in unanticipated vacation relationships may be at increased risk of participating in unsafe sex
with a partner met on holiday due to lack of condom procurement and/or initiation of condom use.
The findings point to the importance of public health efforts to educate women regarding safer sex
precautions when travelling on holiday.
Keywords:

Female tourists, vacation casual sex, condom procurement, sexual bridgers

Introduction
International tourism among young adults has continued to increase over the past several
decades (d'Anjou 2004, International Bureau of Social Tourism 2005). In 2002, people
between the ages of 15-25 years comprised an estimated 20% of the 700 million leisure
travellers world-wide, a figure predicted to climb to 25% by the end of 2005 (Trendafilova
2002). Although young male tourists outnumber their female peers, the number of young
women who undertake leisure travel has increased in recent years, as evidenced by the
proliferation of books and websites dedicated to women's travel experiences (Leo 2003,
McCauley 2004).
Correspondence: Kathleen Ragsdale, National Development and Research Institutes, 71 West 23rd Street, 8th Floor, New York,
NY 10010, USA. Email: katLragsdale@yahoo.com
ISSN 1369-1058 print/ISSN 1464-5351 online ?) 2006 Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/13691050600569570

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86

K. Ragsdale et al.

The sexual risk behaviour that often accompanies international tourism has been
recognized as contributing to HIV/STI transmission for several decades (Carter et aL.1997,
Cabada et al. 2003). Much of the available literature has concentrated on the sexual risk
behaviour of Western male tourists who travel to developing nations to engage in sexual
relationships, often with sex workers who are considerably younger than their clients
(Kruhse-Mount Burton 1995, Thorpe et al. 1997, Campbell, Perkins and Mohammed
1999, Ragsdale and Anders 1999). However, there is growing recognition that female
tourists (many of whom travel alone or in small groups) often engage in sexual relationships
with local residents and fellow tourists while on holiday (Meisch 1995, Maticka-Tyndale
and Herold 1999, Ragsdale 2000, Maticka-Tyndale et al. 2003). In light of projected
increases in the number of young adult tourists-many of whom presumably will be
sexually-active women-as well as young women's disproportionate risk for HIV/STI
acquisition (Centers for Disease Control 2005), there is an urgent need to better
understand the sexual practices of young women vacationing abroad.
International tourism among young women often is framed as an opportunity for selfdiscovery through exploration, which may be expressed through engagement in activities
outside the tourist's normal routines and behaviours. Such holiday-specific activities can
include solo trekking (backpacking), extreme sports, binge drinking, and engaging in vacation
relationships. However, for many young women, the desire to have casual sexual 'adventures'
in a relatively anonymous vacation setting must be reconciled with a multitude of
competing expectations ensuing from social constructions of gender, sexuality and health
(Foucault 1979, Lear 1997). According to Berkeley and Ross (2003: 73), these competing
expectations are integrated into young people's sexual scripts, which results in 'conflicting
messages [and] confusion about the appropriateway to act in expressing their sexuality' (see
also Gagnon 1990). Indeed, as gender scripts have increasingly reflected more sexual equity
between women and men over the past several decades, research suggests that 'expectations
regarding romantic and sexual encounters have been shifting' (Ortiz-Torres, Williams and
Ehrhardt 2003: 1). Presumably these shifts extend to young women's vacation-related
sexual expectations and behaviours. However, there is a paucity of research specifically
exploring casual relationships and risk behaviour among sexually active young women on
holiday abroad.
The present study focused on how women's expectations for vacation-related sexual
experiences shape their actual behaviours while on holiday and examined differences in the
sexual expectations and behaviours of women travelling solo or with one female peer (solo
or paired tourists), or in a group of three or more female peers (group tourists). This
research was conducted with young women vacationing in the Costa Rican
resort town of Jaco in 2001. The primary objectives of this exploratory study were to
assess the relationships between vacation-sex expectations and choice of travelling situation
(solo, paired, or in a group), and behavioural outcomes such as engaging in a relationship
while on vacation, procuring condoms, and initiating condom use with vacation sex
partners.
Review of relevantliteratureand researchquestions
Research that examines sex activity among
and-sand' destinations has primarily been
Australia as 'schoolies' (high school-aged
breakers' (college-aged students). Schoolies

young adult tourists while on holiday at 'sunconducted among package tourists known in
students) and in North America as 'spring
and spring breakers often opt for package tours

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Female tourists and vacation sex expectations

87

where they can travel relatively cheaply to party among large groups of other young adults
at beach destinations during peak vacation periods. Studies conducted among schoolies
and spring breakers suggest that vacation context, lack of adult supervision, and group
dynamics can normalize 'situational disinhibition' (Apostolopoulos et al. 2002) and
thereby increase binge drinking and sexual risk behaviour (Smith and Rosenthal 1997,
Maticka-Tyndale et al. 1998, Maticka-Tyndale and Herold 1999, Maticka-Tyndale et al.
2003).
Group dynamics also may influence sex intentions and sexual contact with new partners
among young adult package tourists. For example, Maticka-Tyndale et al. (2003) found
that female schoolies were twice as likely as males to report pacts among friends to abstain
from casual sex while on vacation. In contrast, although males were nearly five times more
likely than females to form agreements to engage in casual vacation sex, almost 8% of
female schoolies reported that they like many of their male counterparts had formed
pacts to engage in sexual activities while on vacation (Maticka-Tyndale et al. 2003). These
findings suggest that peer influences and group dynamics among female package tourists
may impact upon their vacation sex behaviours.
In contrast to package tourism among youths, adventure tourism (which is also known as
trekkingor vagabond travel) is typicallyfar less structuredand is framed as an opportunityfor
youth travellingsolo or with a small group of friends to experience 'genuine' immersion in the
local culture and interactions with the local population (Murphy 2001). Observations among
female adventuretouristsin Belize, CentralAmerica (Ragsdale2000) and a review of the relevant
literature suggest that travel companion dynamics may influence whether individual women
become involved in casualrelationshipswhile on holiday, in that women who travelsolo or with a
single female companion may be more likelyto engage in vacation relationshipsthan are women
who travel in largergroups (Meisch 1995, Mulhall et al. 1993, Dahles and Bras 1999, Phillips
1999, Maticka-Tyndaleet al. 2003). Possibly, women travellingalone or with one or two close
friends may find greateropportunitiesto initiate vacation relationshipswith locals or with other
tourists, or they may feel less inhibition about doing so than women travellingin largergroups
because there is less risk of their vacation behaviour becoming known at home. Conversely,
women who are consideringthe possibilityof a sexual adventurewhile on holiday may choose to
travel alone or with a small number of trusted companions in order to enhance their chances of
'hookingup' while on vacation. However, the effect of number of travelcompanions (i.e., whether
a woman is travelling solo, paired, or in a group) on women's engagement in vacation
relationships has not been fully explored. Furthermore, although several studies found that
female tourists reported intentions to use condoms with casual sex partners while on vacation
(Mulhall et al. 1997, Maticka-Tyndale and Herold 1999, Maticka-Tyndaleet aL 2003), little is
known regarding women's condom procurement and condom use initiation behaviour on
holiday.
As a first step toward filling gaps in the current literature, this study explored the
following for a small sample of young women vacationing in a Costa Rican resort town.
First, women with vacation casual sex expectations are more likely than other women to
travel solo or with a single companion rather than in a group of three or more; second, prior
expectations of sex on vacation will be associated with: (a) engaging in vacation
relationship(s); (b) condom procurement while on vacation; and (c) in association with
condom procurement, with initiating condom use with vacation sex partners; and third,
women who travel solo or paired are more likely than are women who travel in groups: (a)
to have vacation relationships; (b) to procure condoms; and (c) to initiate condom use with
their vacation sex partners.

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88

K. Ragsdale et al.

Method
Participants and recruitment

Data were collected from a convenience sample of 128 female tourists vacationing in the resort
town of Jaco, Costa Rica, between May and August, 2001. Summer travel to Jac' is especially
popular among budget-minded young adult surfers and students. As tourism has grown in
Jac6, economic migration has brought an influx of young Costa Rican men to the Jaco area
seeking tourist-sector employment as canopy tour operators, bartenders, and restaurant
servers. Young men also migrate from neighbouring Central American countries to find work
in Jaco as street artisans and vendors for the tourist market. Consequently, the demographics
of Jac6 are skewed towards a large population of transient young adults (including internal,
regional, and international migrants), with roughly twice as many men as women.
The primary recruitment site was the 4.5 kilometres of beachfront that attracts tourists to
the Jaco area. Female tourists who were unaccompanied by male companions were
approached by a female investigator who briefly described the study. Women who agreed to
participate were administered a short eligibility screening instrument to verify the following
inclusion criteria: heterosexual, 18 years of age or older, English-speaking, a tourist
(defined as a person who had been in the area for less than 3 months), sexually active on
vacation (defined as not voluntarily abstaining from sexual relations), and single (defined as
unaccompanied by a male 'romantic' partner). Eligible women completed an anonymous
survey on the spot. Among the 303 women initially approached to participate in the study,
there was a 36% refusal rate (n= 108). Women who declined to participate most often cited
having limited time in which to complete the survey as their reason for non-participation.
Among the remaining 195 women, 34% (n=67) were ineligible to participate in the study,
primarily due to being under the age of 18 years.
The Institutional Review Board of the University of Florida approved the consent
procedures for this project, which included informing participants of the sexual nature of
the research and their right to refuse to answer any question or to terminate the survey at
any time. To ensure anonymity, no individual identifiers were collected. Respondents were
not compensated for their participation. The survey was administered during a face-to-face
interview and required approximately 20 minutes to complete.
Study measures

The semi-structured survey elicited information in the following areas: sociodemographic

characteristics, number of travel companions, expectations for casual sex while on vacation,
condom procurement, engagement in vacation relationships, initiating condom use with
causal sex partners during the vacation, alcohol use while on holiday, sexual risk and
condom-related attitudes and behaviour, and sexual history.
Sociodemographiccharacteristics.Participants were asked their age, ethnicity, educational
attainment, annual income, and country of origin. For purposes of analysis, these variables
were recoded as follows: ethnicity was dichotomized as 'White (non-Hispanic)' or 'other';
education as '< high school or equivalent' or 'some college or above'; occupation as
'college student' or 'other'; annual income as '< $10,000' or '>$10,000'; and country of
residence as 'USA' or 'non-USA'.
Travel companions. Participants were asked whether they were travelling alone (solo), with
one female companion (paired), or in a group with two or more female companions (group).

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Female tourists and vacation sex expectations

89

Sex expectations. Two 'yes/no' items were used to assess respondents' vacation sex
expectations: 'I thought about the possibility of having sex abroad while I was planning my
vacation' and 'I intended to have sex while vacationing'. Women who answered 'yes' to
either of these questions were coded as having positive vacation sex expectations.
Condom procurement.Two 'yes/no' items were used to assess whether participants had
procured condoms prior to or during their vacation: 'I brought condoms with me on this
trip' and 'I purchased condoms while on this trip'. These items were combined into a
dichotomous indicator variable for condom procurement ('yes' on either item).
Vacation relationships.To assess the types of vacation relationships in which participants
engaged, they were asked to check one or more blanks on the item: 'Have you met a
or local
and begun a relationship?'. Responses to this item were used to
traveller
a
variable
construct dichotomous
indicating whether participants had engaged in a vacation
relationship and to distinguish between women who had had one or more relationships
with men drawn from the local population and those whose partners were drawn from the
tourist population at the site.
Condomuse initiation. The yes/no item, 'I have initiated using condoms with a partner met
on vacation' was used to assess whether respondents had initiated condom use during their
vacation relationships.
Alcohol use while on vacation. Participants were asked to characterize their alcohol use in
Jaco as none (abstaining from alcohol use during the vacation period), light (1-2 drinks per
typical drinking episode), moderate (3-4 drinks per typical drinking episode), or heavy (5
or more drinks per typical drinking episode). Because only 4% (none users) and 10%
(heavy users) of the sample were at the extremes of this scale, alcohol use was dichotomized
as 'none/light' versus 'moderate/heavy' for the analyses.
Sexual impulsivity, condom use attitudes, and risky sexual behaviour. Four 'agree/disagree'

items were adapted from previous research among heterosexually-active young women
(DeCarlo et al. 1998) and supplemented with three additional 'yes/no' questions to assess
sexual impulsivity, condom use attitudes, and past risky sexual behaviour: (1) 'I'm cautious
rather than impulsive regarding casual sex'; (2) 'Having casual sex can put me at risk of
getting HIV'; (3) 'It is embarrassing to talk about using condoms with a new sex partner,
and so I tend to avoid this'; (4) 'It is a man's responsibility to supply condoms for sex'; (5)
'Is it difficult to use condoms'; (6) 'Do you think any sexual practices in your past put
you at risk for HIV?'; and (7) 'Have you ever had unsafe sex with someone you thought
might be at risk for HIV?'. Responses to the first 4 items were assessed on a 5-point Likert
scale

(1=strongly

disagree, 2=moderately

disagree,

3=undecided,

4=moderately

agree,

and 5 =strongly agree). Respondents answered 'yes' or 'no' to the remaining items.
Statistical analyses

Univariate comparisons by travel companionship type and casual sex expectations were
conducted on sociodemographic background and vacation-specific behaviour measures,
including relationship characteristics, vacation sex outcomes, and alcohol use. Pearson Chi
Square tests were used to assess the statistical significance of between-group differences.

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90

K Ragsdale et al.

Multivariate logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine the main research
hypotheses. Outcome variables for these analyses included engaging in one or more
vacation relationships; procuring condoms prior to or during the vacation; and initiating
condom use with a casual sex partner met on holiday (for the latter outcome, only women
who reported having a relationship while on vacation were included in the analysis). A
stepwise procedure was used to test all sociodemographic, behavioural, and attitudinal
variables for inclusion in the regression models. Given the rather small sample size, as well
as the exploratory nature of the study, a p-value<. 10 was established as the threshold for
retaining predictors in the models. For all other analyses, criterion alpha was set to .05.
Results
Table 1 summarizes the characteristics of the 128 tourist women who participated in the
study. Thirty-four per cent (n=43) travelled solo, 42% (n=54) travelled in a pair, and 24%
(n=31) travelled in a group. Because solo and paired tourists were similar on all three
vacation sex outcome measures, they were combined into a single category (solo/paired)
and contrasted with group tourists in the analyses.
Sixty (47%) of the tourist women reported one or more vacation relationship(s). Most of
these women (62%) had relationships only with local males; 23% had relationships only
with other tourists; and 15% had relationships with both local and tourist partners. Just
over half (52%) of the 60 women who had a relationship reported condom use initiation.
Women who had a relationship with a local (n=46) were no more likely to initiate condom
use than were women who did not have a local partner (n= 14) 52% versus 50%,
respectively.
Overall 28% (n=36) of the women had procured condoms prior to or during their
vacation in Jaco. Women who procured condoms were significantly more likely than
women who had not done so to report one or more relationships while vacationing in Jaco
(75% versus 36%, respectively, x2 (1,128) = 15.91, p<.001).
Table 1. Participant characteristics and vacation behaviors, by travel companion type and sex expectations.
Travel Companion Type
All (N= 128)
% (n)
Sociodemographiccharacteristics
Age < 22 years
Education: some college or above
Ethnicity: white (non-Hispanic)
Income < $10,000
College student
US resident
Vacation alcohol use
Moderate to heavy alcohol use
Vacationsex outcomevariables
Procured condoms
One or more vacation relationships
- Initiated condom usea

52
79
87
64
59
72

(67)
(101)
(111)
(82)
(76)
(92)

Solo/Paired
(n=97)
% (n)

Group
(n=31)
% (n)

42
81
86
58
54
69

84
71
90
84
77
81

(41)***
(79)
(83)
(56)**
(52)*
(67)

58 (74)

60 (58)

28 (36)
47 (60)
52 (31)

35 (34)**
52 (50)t
58 (29)*

(26)
(22)
(28)
(26)
(24)
(25)

52 (16)
6.5 (2)
32 (10)
20 (2)

Casual Sex Expectations

Yes
(n=63)
% (n)
49
78
89
67
63
59

(31)
(49)
(56)
(42)
(40)
(37)

56 (35)
49 (31)***
62 (39)**
64 (25)**

No
(n=65)
% (n)
55
80
85
62
55
85

(36)
(52)
(55)
(40)
(36)
(55)

60 (39)
7-7 (5)
32 (21)
29 (6)

a
1.
Statistics were calculated only for the subsample of participants (n=60)
tp= .06; * p<.05; ** p<.Ol; *** p<.00
who had a relationship while on vacation.

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Female tourists and vacation sex expectations

91

Univariate comparisons

Compared to group tourists, solo/paired tourists were likely to be older (X2 (1,128) =16.3,
p<.00 1), to earn more than $10,000 per year (X2 (1,128)=6.972, p=.008), and to be nonstudents (X2(1,128)=5.522, p=.019), as indicated in table 1. Solo/paired tourist women
also were more likely than group tourists to have procured condoms prior to or during their
vacation (X2 (1,128)=9.506, p=.002), to have had one or more relationships while on
vacation (trend: X2(1,128) =3.510, p= .061), and to have initiated condom use if they had a
vacation relationship (X2 (1,60)=4.819, p=.028).
Just under half (49%; n=63) of the women reported that they anticipated having casual
sex while on vacation. These women did not differ from women without vacation sex
expectations on any sociodemographic indicator (table 1). However, women who expected
to have sex were more likely to have procured condoms (X2(1,128)=26.126, p<.001), to
have had a relationship while on vacation (X2(1,128)=12.549, p<.001), and to have
initiated condom use in a relationship (X2(1,60) = 8.543, p=.003) than were women who
did not anticipate having vacation sex.
As hypothesized, women who anticipated having sex were more likely to have travelled
solo/paired than were women who did not plan to have sex while on vacation (57% vs.
29%, respectively, x2 (1, 128)=7.194, p=.007). Also as expected, among women who
engaged in one or more vacation relationships, those who had procured condoms were
more likely than non-procurers to initiate condom use (70% vs. 36%, respectively, x2
(1,60)=6.877, p=.009).
Multivariate analyses

Logistic regression analyses were conducted to assess the independent contributions of

vacation sex expectations and travel companion type in predicting each of the three
behavioural outcome variables (had a relationship, procured condoms, initiated condom
use in a relationship). The stepwise models also included sociodemographic background
variables, measures of sexual impulsivity and condom use attitudes, alcohol use, and items
on past risky sexual behaviour as possible controls on the main associations.
The regression analysis predicting whether or not women had a vacation relationship is
summarized in table 2a. The odds of having a vacation relationship among women who
reported casual sex expectations were more than twice as large as those for participants who
reported that they did not expect to engage in vacation sex (OR=2.4, 95% CI= 1.1, 5.3).
Higher income women were significantly less likely to have had a vacation relationship than
were low income participants (OR=.4, 95% CI=.2, .8). Although solo/paired travellers
were more likely to report vacation relationships than were women who travelled in groups
(OR=2.6, 95% CI= 1.0, 6.8), and women who were more cautious about casual sex were
less likely to report vacation relationships (OR=.7, 95% CI=.4, 1.0), these differences were
not statistically significant at the p<.05 level (p=.056 and p=.072, respectively). The
overall model explained 21 % of the variance in the relationship outcome variable.
The regression predicting condom procurement (table 2b) indicated that women who
reported casual sex expectations had almost 12 times the odds of procuring condoms either
before or during vacation than were participants without such expectations (OR= 11.7,
95% CI=3.4, 40.2), and women who were travelling solo/paired had more than five times
the odds of procuring condoms than those who travelled in groups (OR=5.6, 95%
CI= 1.04, 30.6). The results also showed that participants who consumed moderate or
heavy amounts of alcohol (OR=4.5, 95% CI=1.4, 14.1) and those who were non-US

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92

IK Ragsdale et al.

Table 2. Logistic regression analyses.

(a) Analysis predicting whether respondent had a relationship while on vacation.
Predictora

Adjusted Odds Ratio

Casual sex expectations

Travelling solo or with one companion
Annual income : $10,000
Cautious regarding casual sex

95% Conf. Interval

2.39
2.57
.37
.67

1.08,
.98,
.16,
.44,

5.28
6.77b

.85
1.04c

Model chi-square (4, 123)=21.79, p<.001.

(b) Analysis predicting whether respondent procured condoms prior to or during vacation.
Predictora

Adjusted Odds Ratio

Casual sex expectations

Travelling solo or with one companion
Moderate to heavy alcohol use
Non-US resident
Man's responsibility to supply condoms

11.74
5.63
4.48
5.19
.45

95% Conf. Interval

3.43,
1.04,
1.43,
1.72,
.25,

40.19
30.57
14.08
15.64
.81

Model chi-square (5, 122) = 59.46, p<.001.

(c) Analysis predicting whether respondents who had a vacation relationship (n=60) initiated condom use with
vacation sex partner.
Predictora

Adjusted Odds Ratio

Casual sex expectations

Moderate to heavy alcohol use
Cautious regarding casual sex
Embarrassed to discuss condoms

4.97
7.98
.51
.38

95% Conf. Interval

1.17,
1.87,
.24,
.16,

21.14
34.10
1.07d

0.88

Model chi-square (4, 123)=25.72, p<.001. a Variables tested for entry into each model included casual sex
expectations, travel companionship types, all demographic factors, and items related to sexual impulsivity, condom
use attitudes, alcohol use, and previous sexual risk behaviour. The model for condom use initiation also included a
predictor for condom procurement, which was not significantly associated with that outcome. bTrend: p=.056.
cTrend: p=.072. dTrend: p=.075.

residents (OR=5.2, 95% CI=1.7, 15.6) were more likely to procure condoms for casual
vacation sex. Conversely, participants who felt more strongly that it was the man's
responsibility to supply condoms had lower rates of condom procurement (OR=.5, 95%
CI=.3, .8). Together, these five predictors explained 53% of the variance in the outcome.
The final regression analysis focused on condom use initiation among the 60 women who
reported having a vacation relationship (table 2c). Four predictors were selected in the
model. Participants who expected to have sex on vacation had almost five times greater
odds of initiating condom use than those who had not anticipated engaging in vacation sex
(OR=4.97, 95% CI= 1.2, 21. 1). Women who reported moderate or heavy alcohol use also
were significantly more likely to initiate condom use with their partners (OR=8.0, 95%
CI= 1.9, 34.1). In contrast, women who indicated more embarrassment in talking about
condoms were significantly less likely to initiate condom use (OR=.4, 95% CI=.2, .9). The
regression analysis also revealed a non-significant trend (p=.08) whereby women who were
cautious about sex were less likely to initiate condom use. Notably, travel companion type
(i.e., solo/paired vs. group) was not a significant predictor of condom use initiation after

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Female tourists and vacation sex expectations

93

controlling for other covariates (p= . 11). Overall, the regression model explained 47% of
the variance in condom use initiation.
Discussion
Understanding the role of transient populations in the spread of STIs is recognized as
integral to HIV prevention world-wide, and has become more important as increasingly
large numbers of sexually-active individuals come into contact with new sexual partners
through domestic and international travel. Individuals whose sexual networking behaviours
may link high and low risk populations are often referred to in the HIV/STI literature
'bridgers'. Historically, investigations of sexual bridge populations have concentrated on
migratory male labourers and other men who engage in 'unprotected sex with high and low
risk partners' (Gorbach et al. 2000: 320, see also Lacerda et al. 1997, Stratford et al. 2000,
Lau and Thomas 2001).
Among tourist populations, much of the literature on sexual bridgers has concentrated
on men who have sex with men (MSM), including sex tourists and gay or bisexual male sex
workers (Benotsch et al. 2006, Ford et al. 1995, Joesoef et al. 2003). Yet heterosexual casual
sex among tourists and locals may also link high and low risk populations. As Forsythe
(1999) points outs, tourists who engage in unprotected casual sex may pose considerable
risk to local populations as well as to their regular sex partners, especially when tourists
engage in sexual behaviours abroad that may puts them at high risk of transmitting or
contracting HIV/STIs. According to Forsythe:
[Tourists] tend to drink more, use drugs more, and be generallymore adventurouswhile on
holiday.Such adventuresoften includetakingsexualrisks.Whentouristshavesex with prostitutes,
hotel staff, and othersin the local population,a bridgecan be createdfor HIV to cross back and
forth between the tourist'shome countryand the touristdestination.(1999: 4)
The present study assessed casual sex expectations, vacation relationships, condom
procurement, and condom use initiation with casual sex partners among 128 single tourist
women on holiday in Costa Rica, Central America. The results of the study support the
literature that suggests that behavioural intentions and group dynamics strongly influence
young women's holiday sexual behaviours (Smith and Rosenthal 1997, Maticka-Tyndale
et al. 1998, Apostolopoulos et al. 2002, Maticka-Tyndale et al. 2003). Participants who
expected to have vacation sex were significantly more likely to engage in vacation
relationships, to procure condoms, and to initiate condom use with casual sex partners met
on holiday. Similarly, women who travelled solo or with a single companion were more
likely than women who travelled in groups of three or more to have had a vacation
relationship and to have procured condoms. Although, in the univariate analyses, condom
use initiation was more likely among solo/paired travellers than among group travellers,
travel companionship type was not significantly associated with initiation of condom use
after controlling for other variables. (It is possible that the non-significant multivariate
relationship was due to the low statistical power afforded by our sub-sample of 60 women
who had at least one vacation relationship, and that analysis of a larger sample may have
resulted in an independent association between travel companion type and condom use
initiation.)

As hypothesized, women who anticipated having sex on holiday were significantly more
likely to have travelled to Jaco by themselves or with a single travelling companion. Women
who anticipated having sex may have chosen to travel alone or with a friend in order to
facilitate 'hooking up' with one or more vacation sex partners. Travelling solo or with a

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K Ragsdale et al.

single companion likely provides more independence and greater opportunities for meeting
potential sex partners than do the more structured activities that typically are associated
with group travel. Alternately, group dynamics and social norms regarding casual sex may
inhibit women travelling in groups from initiating sexual relationships while on holiday.
Importantly, vacation sex intentions and the number of travelling companions were
independently associated with the key behavioural outcomes. Thus, although vacation sex
intentions may have influenced participants' choices of travelling companions, both
intentions and the travelling situation (solo/paired versus group) affected their actual
behaviour while on holiday.
Women who reported moderate to heavy alcohol consumption were more likely than
lighter drinkers to have procured condoms and to have initiated condom use if they had a
relationship in Jaco. Although excessive alcohol use is often correlated with sexual risk
behaviour among adolescents and young adults (Bonomo et al. 2001, Poulin and Graham
2001), in our sample it is possible that some women came to Jaco with the intention of
'getting wild', drinking too much, and 'hooking-up' (i.e., engaging in sexual relationships)
with locals and other tourists. Their 'wild' behaviour was, in a sense, premeditated, as were
their intentions to reduce their risk by procuring condoms and initiating condom use with
their vacation partners.
This study has several potential limitations. It was conducted among a convenience
sample drawn from a transient population composed of tourist women. Although nonrandom sampling is regularly used to conduct research among transient populations
(Singer 1999), care is needed when generalizing the results of this study to other women
who may be similarly at-risk due to casual sex activity. Given that the sample was composed
predominantly of White (non-Hispanic) college-aged women from the USA, our findings
may not be representative of all tourist women who engaged in vacation relationships while
on holiday abroad. Another sampling limitation is that-because the study focus was on
women who travelled to Jac6 unaccompanied by a male partner-only those women
without a male escort were approached at the study site. This recruitment strategy may
have excluded some women who were accompanied at that time by a partner met in Jaco,
and therefore may have artificiallyreduced the number of study participants who reported a
vacation relationship.
The study utilized self-reported data, which may reflect a reporting bias in that women
who felt comfortable disclosing sexually sensitive information may have been overrepresented in the sample. The study did not control for the length of time respondents had
been in Jac6, which may have confounded the association between engaging in one or more
vacation relationships and the main predictor variables. For example, Bellis et al. (2004)
found that length of vacation stay was positively correlated with casual sex such that 'those
that do have sex in Ibiza (and arrive without a sexual partner) often accumulate ... as many
new partners in an average 10 day stay as they do over an entire 6 months before their visit'
(p. 46; see also Matteelli and Carosi 2001). Despite the limitations discussed above, given
the scarcity of existing data on sexual risk among international tourists in general, and
among female travellers in particular, the present study supplies a needed analysis of casual
sex among female tourists abroad.
Our findings support the call for gender-specific sexual health campaigns designed to
target college-aged female tourists during peak travel periods for young adults (Bellis et al.
2004). Such campaigns should be designed to increase knowledge of HIV/STI prevention
measures, enhance condom use self-efficacy, and improve risk reduction skills among
college-aged women, as these have proven to be effective HIV/STI prevention strategies

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Female tourists and vacation sex expectations

95

among young persons (Parsons et al. 2000, Aggleton and Warwick 2002, Berkeley and Ross
2003). The findings from this study also suggest that women who do not 'intend' to engage
in vacation sex may be most at risk of participation in unsafe sex with a casual sex partner
met on holiday due to lack of condom procurement and/or initiation of condom use.
Additionally, our finding that women were more likely to engage in a vacation relationship
with local men than with other tourists has implications for increased STI infection rates
among local populations as well as among women travellers, particularly those travelling to
regions with high STI or HIV prevalence rates.
Acknowledgements
The data collection phase of this study was supported by University of Florida Center for
Latin American Studies. Data analysis and manuscript development were supported by
T32 MH19958, NRSA Post-doctoral Training Program in HIV Prevention Research at
CAIR, (S. D. Pinkerton, PI), NIMH grant P30-MH52776 (J. A. Kelly, PI) and the
Fordham University Center for Ethics Education (C. B. Fisher, Director). The primary
author was supported as a postdoctoral fellow in the Behavioral Sciences Training in Drug
Abuse Research program sponsored by Medical and Health Research Association of New
York City, Inc. (MHRA) and the National Development and Research Institutes (NDRI)
with funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (5T32 DA07233). Points of view,
opinions, and conclusions in this paper do not necessarily represent the official position of
the US Government, Medical and Health Association of New York City, Inc. or National
Development and Research Institutes. The authors would like to thank Celia Fisher,
Cheryl Gore-Felton, and Melanie Moretz for analytic and editorial insights, and to the
respondents for their generous participation.
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Resume
L'objectif principal de cette etude etait d'etudier, chez les touristes de sexe feminin au
Costa Rica, les relations entre les attentes sexuelles liees aux vacances et les types de
voyages (en solo, a deux et en groupe), ainsi que les comportements resultant de ceux-ci,
tels que l'engagement de relations au cours des vacances, la facon de se procurer des
preservatifs, et l'initiation de l'utilisation de preservatifs avec des partenaires sexuels
rencontres pendant les vacances. Un bref entretien a eu lieu pour evaluer les
caracteristiques socio-demographiques, les attentes sexuelles et les relations liees aux
vacances, les caracteristiques des relations sexuelles occasionnelles, et la consommation
d'alcool dans un echantillon de commodite de 128 touristes de sexe feminin et celibataires,
agees de 18 ans et plus. Une analyse variee et multivariee a &etmenee pour examiner les
rapports entre les variables d'int6ret. Les femmes qui voyagent en solo ou en compagnie
d'une autre femme, de meme que celles qui anticipaient d'avoir des rapports sexuels
pendant leurs vacances, etaient plus susceptibles que d'autres touristes de sexe feminin de
declarer avoir eu une ou plusieurs relations au cours de leurs vacances, de s'etre procure des
preservatifs, et d'en avoir initie l'utilisation avec un partenaire rencontre pendant leurs
vacances. Les femmes qui s'engagent dans des relations non anticipees durant leurs
vacances peuvent s'exposer a un risque accru de rapports non proteges avec un partenaire
rencontre dans cette periode, parce qu'elles ne disposent pas de preservatifs et/ou qu'elles
ne les proposent pas a leurs partenaires. Les resultats soulignent l'importance des efforts en
sante publique visant a informer les femmes concernant le sexe sans risque pendant leurs
vacances.
Resumen
El principal objetivo de este estudio fue examinar, por una parte, las relaciones entre las
expectativas sexuales durante las vacaciones y el tipo de compania cuando se viaja (solo, en
pareja o en grupo), y, por otra, la conducta de mujeres turistas en Costa Rica, tales como
tener una relacion durante las vacaciones, comprar preservativos o empezar a usar
preservativos con compafieros sexuales en vacaciones. Se llevaron a cabo entrevistas breves
entre una muestra conveniente de 128 turistas solteras mayores de edad para analizar las
caracteristicas sociodemograficas, las expectativas y las relaciones sexuales durante las
vacaciones, las variables de sexo casual y el consumo de alcohol. Utilizamos analisis
univariantes y multivariantes para examinar las relaciones entre las variables de interes. Las
mujeres que viajaban solas o con una amiga y las mujeres que anticipaban tener relaciones
sexuales durante las vacaciones mostraron ma'sprobabilidad que otras turistas de tener una

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K Ragsdale et al.

o mas relaciones en las vacaciones, de haber adquirido preservativos y haber empezado a

usar condones con un compafiero sexual cuando estaban de vacaciones. Las mujeres que
acabaron teniendo relaciones no anticipadas durante las vacaciones presentaban mas
riesgos de participar en relaciones sexuales no seguras con un companero que conocieron
de vacaciones debido a no haber comprado preservativos o no haber iniciado el uso de
estos. Los resultados sefialan que es importante que los responsables de la salud puiblica se
esfuercen por educar a las mujeres sobre que precauciones tomar para tener relaciones
sexuales seguras cuando se van de vacaciones.

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