The primary purpose of this research was to examine the relationship between individualism and attitudes toward four types of sexual behavior, specifically adolescent sex, premarital sex, extramarital sex, and homosexual sexual behavior. A secondary purpose was to add to the conceptual and methodological discussions of individualism. In the United States these behaviors are becoming more common and attitudes generally more accepting. What remains unclear and under theorized is why? I address this question from the frame of the intersection of sexuality studies with the study of deviance as these behaviors have been considered to fit normative, absolutists, statistical and/or reactive definitions of deviance. This research was informed by Hawdon's recent general model of deviant behavior. In brief, one of Hawdon's contributions to the study of deviance is his addition of the cultural value of individualism as an explanatory variable related to cross-cultural rates of drug use. The primary research question that guided this research was: Is individualism related to attitudes toward adolescent sex, premarital sex, extramarital sex, and homosexual sexual behavior? Utilizing data from the General Social Survey, this question was examined using a variety of conceptualizations of individualism to test the relationship between individualism and attitudes toward the various sexual behaviors for five time periods--1998, 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006. Three major hypotheses were posed regarding the relationship between individualism and attitudes toward perceived sexual deviance. The analysis did not support the hypotheses. Reasons for this lack of support for the theoretical perspective were discussed. / Ph. D.

A questionnaire was used to study causal attribution to social roles as influenced by perceived deviance of the role, instructions to identify with the role, and participant gender. The perceived deviance or nondeviance of the roles was determined by a pilot study. The roles were varied randomly through 12 hypothetical events, and identification or nonidentification instructions randomly assigned. The participants were 194 male and female university students. Participants gave the cause of each event and rated the cause on five dimensions: internality, externality, stability, globality, and controllability. Causal attribution to deviant social roles was found to result in a significantly higher across-scales score and to be more internal, less external, and more global than attribution to nondeviant roles. Participant gender showed an interaction with deviance overall and on the dimensions of stability and globality due to significantly higher ratings by women participants than those by men. Identification instructions did not produce a significant effect.