Behavioral risk in early adolescents with HIV+ mothers.

PURPOSE: To examine the effect of maternal human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection on sexual and drug use risk behavior, delinquency, and general behavior problems in early adolescents.

METHODS: Baseline data from an ongoing longitudinal study are presented. Participants are 220 HIV-negative early adolescents (aged 10-14 years), 100 with HIV-infected mothers, and 120 with uninfected mothers from ethnic minority, low income, families living in inner-city communities. For two group comparisons, Chi-square and Student's t-tests were used. Multiple and Logistic regressions were conducted to control for age and examine multiple predictors simultaneously.

RESULTS: Few early adolescents, particularly those younger than 13 years, reported penetrative sexual behavior (oral, anal, or vaginal sex, 7%) or drug use (12%). Nonpenetrative sexual behaviors (kissing, 35%), alcohol use (39%), and engaging in at least one delinquent activity (45% of boys, 26% of girls) were more common. By age 14 years, 21% of the youths reported penetrative sexual behavior and 72% reported alcohol use. Penetrative sexual behavior was significantly associated with delinquent behavior and substance use. There were no differences in risk behaviors between youth with and without HIV-infected mothers. However, among youth with HIV+ mothers, those who knew their mother's status had more thought problems (p = .042) and reported more frequent alcohol use (p = .018) than those youth who didn't know.

CONCLUSIONS: Maternal HIV status did not significantly add to the risk for problem behaviors in our sample of urban ethnic minority early adolescents. Fourteen years of age appeared to be a critical time for increased experimenting with sexual behavior and substance use.