Communication and Use of Grindr in HIV Awareness Among College Students in a Private University in Metro Manila

Abstract

There were one hundred college students in a private university in Metro Manila surveyed through developed and self-developed research instruments to determine their HIV awareness through Grindr, a gay dating application. Additional self-developed research instrument was used for key informants, which answers supported results on communication and use of Grindr by the respondents. Presumed on the New Media Theory by Vogt (2017), the study determined the correlation between the independent variables (communication and use of Grindr, HIV awareness, Grindr engagements, HIV infection consciousness, expert's view on HIV awareness) and the dependent variable ( contents for the proposed NSTP subject). On the other hand, mediating variables on socio-demographic characteristics of respondents (age, year level, course, sexual role, relationship status, purpose in using Grindr, Grindr activities) also used the theory to test its relevancy. Relationships were tested and were set at 0.05 levels of significance. One way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to test the significance of the means and t-test as well as z-test for independent means as intra test. The results generated from the study revealed that college students were not fully aware of the HIV infection until infected with the virus. The study simply interpreted the result that Grindr, as gay dating applications is not focusing on HIV, but heavily on gay dating. Though, HIV awareness is visible in Grindr, the attitudes and values of college students subscribing Grindr implies high risk of getting HIV infection.