Seeing the Forest With the Trees: Cybersex as a Case Study of Single-Item Versus Multi-Item Measures of Sexual Behaviour

Single-item measures of sexual behaviours are often used in sex research despite wide acknowledgment of their limitations. In this study, we used cybersex as a case study to examine how well a single-item measure captured the incidence of a sexual behaviour. To do so, we examined whether participants' reports on single-item and multi-item measures of cybersex were concordant (i.e., participants report experience on both measures) or discordant (i.e., participants report experience on one measure but not the other). Heterosexual participants ( N = 376) completed a single-item and multi-item measure of lifetime cybersex experience, as well as a background questionnaire, a measure of socially desirable responding, frequency of cybersex experience, and frequency of other online sexual activities. A χ 2 analysis revealed that significantly more participants reported concordant responses (71.5%) than endorsed the multi-item measure only (26.6%), or the single-item measure only (1.9%). In addition, a χ 2 analysis indicated that, compared with the proportion of participants who had cybersex experience with a nonpartner, a greater proportion of participants who had cybersex experience only with their primary partner endorsed the multi-item measure but not the single-item measure. A discriminant function analysis indicated that participants with more sexual experience online and offline were more likely to be concordant; gender, age, hours spent online in a week, and socially desirable responding did not discriminate concordant from discordant responders. The findings specifically indicate that single-item measures of cybersex are limited in their accuracy. To address this limitation, researchers should use clear, specific, multi-item measures to assess sexual behaviour domains. Les mesures d'un seul facteur dans les comportements sexuels sont souvent utilisées dans le cadre de recherches sur la sexualité malgré le fait que leurs limites soient généralement reconnues. Dans cette étude, les auteurs ont utilisé le cybersexe comme étude de cas pour examiner dans quelle mesure l'évaluation d'un seul facteur rendait compte de la fréquence d'un comportement sexuel. Pour ce faire, ils ont examiné si les déclarations des participants sur des mesures d'un seul et de multiples éléments étaient concordantes (ces derniers déclaraient avoir fait l'expérience des deux éléments), ou discordantes (ils rapportaient l'expérience d'un des deux éléments seulement). Des participants hét