Perceived Social Support and Condom Use in Urban Cameroon

Basile O. Tambashe, Tulane University
Gervais Beninguisse, Institut De Formation Et De Recherche Demographiques (IFORD)

Borrowing elements from the theory of reasoned action, this paper examines the relationship between perceived social support and condom use in urban Cameroon. In particular, we examine what sexually active people perceive about the attitude of their “significant others” regarding condom use and the extent to which this perception influences their condom use. We discuss the role of social support as conceptualized in the social learning theory and the theory of reasoned action as well as the mechanisms through which perceived social support is likely to influence condom use. Using logistic regression on data from a 2001-survey of 2632 sexually active men and women aged 15-39 on barriers to condom use that was carried out in Yaounde and Douala, Cameroon we show that, ceteris paribus, perceived social support is a statistically powerful predictor of condom use.