Economic preferences and risky sexual behaviours amongst youth in Zimbabwe

Young people in sub-Saharan Africa are particularly at high risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. Using data from economic experiments conducted amongst persons aged 15-29 years in Zimbabwe, we investigate the association between key individual preferences - risk aversion, altruism, present-bias and future-bias - at baseline and Herpes Simplex Virus type 2 (HSV-2) status and number of sexual partners measured 12 months later.