I Did What Last Night?!!! Adolescent Risky Sexual Behaviors and Substance Use

This purpose of this paper is to examine the causal impact of substance use on risky sexual behaviors by teenagers. Risky sexual behaviors, which include unprotected sex and multiple partners, are highly correlated with alcohol and illicit drug use, although the nature of the causal relationship is in question. This study uses two-stage least squares and reduced form models to examine the relationship between substance use and sexual behaviors by gender. Data come from the Youth Risk Behavior Surveys. Result show that alcohol use does not increase the likelihood of having sex or of having multiple partners, although alcohol use does lower the probability of using birth control and condoms among sexually active teens.