Personal Risk Taking And The Spread Of Disease: Beyond Core Groups

Disease control efforts directed at human immunodeficiency virus are predicated on the need to reduce personal risk behaviors; that approach may not adequately reflect the complicated interplay between personal behaviors and the social setting in which they occur. Efforts to date, including the appl...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of infectious diseases 1996-10, Vol.174 (Supplement-2), p.S144-S149
Main Authors: Rothenberg, Richard B., Potterat, John J., Woodhouse, Donald E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
AIDS
AIDS/HIV
Disease risk
Disease transmission
Epidemics
Epidemiology
Gonorrhea
HIV
HIV Infections - prevention & control
HIV Infections - transmission
Humans
Models, Theoretical
Risk-Taking
Sexual transmission
Sexually transmitted diseases
Social networks
Social Support
Sociology, Medical - methods
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Summary:Disease control efforts directed at human immunodeficiency virus are predicated on the need to reduce personal risk behaviors; that approach may not adequately reflect the complicated interplay between personal behaviors and the social setting in which they occur. Efforts to date, including the application of population ecology, the development of the core group hypothesis, and the use of compartment models to describe disease transmission, have aided in understanding the dynamics of transmission and have highlighted the relationship between personal risk taking and population risk. An area for further development is the application of the techniques of social network analysis to infectious disease spread. Initial work suggests that social structure may act as a barrier (or facilitator) in disease transmission and that the epidemiologic impact of a risky act varies with the social setting. The local context for risk behaviors has important implications for the dynamics of transmission.
ISSN:0022-1899
1537-6613
DOI:10.1093/infdis/174.Supplement_2.S144