Emotional responses to casual sex experiences: The roles of sexual motives and romantic attachment styles.

This thesis examined casual sex motivations and styles of adult romantic attachment as individual difference factors related to young adults' post-casual sex emotional well-being. Phase 1 of this thesis focused on the development of an approach and avoidance casual sex motivations scale. The results yielded five distinct casual sex motivations (pleasure, establish an intimate connection, avoid an intimate connection, self-affirmation, and coping/stress relief). Phase 2 explored the relationships between the styles of adult romantic attachment, casual sex motivations, and post-casual sex emotional responses. The patterns of correlations between the casual sex motivations and post-casual sex emotional responses were found to differ across two hypothetical casual sex scenarios. The casual sex motivations were found to be differentially related to the styles of adult romantic attachment. Overall, the findings were in support of existing theories on motivation and emotion and adult attachment.