U. grad speaks on men with HIV

University graduate Steve Schwartzberg spoke Thursday night about the psychological struggle faced by men who are HIV positve. The speech, which was part of HIV/AIDS Awareness Week, attracted an audience of about 20 people. In his presentation, Schwartzberg, a fellow in clinical psychology at Harvard University Medical School, touched on personal experiences of HIV positive men. "I am primarily interested in how gay men as a tribe, especially HIV positive men, have ascribed meanings to AIDS," he said. "This is not a dispassionate presentation and it might evoke emotions in people." Schwartzberg interviewed 19 HIV positive men in New York, Boston and Philadelphia over a period of 6 months and gathered different aspects of how his interviewees view HIV. Throughout the presentation, he gave excerpts of the interviews to personalize the findings for the audience. He classified the data into ten distinct groups, ranging from optimism to pessimism. "Among the 19 men that I interviewed," he said. "Some of them thought of being HIV positive as a personal growth process, but some considered it a irreparable loss." Shattered beliefs in man's expectation of the world around them accounted for the differences in reactions to being HIV positive, Schwartzberg said. "People have fundamental needs to make sense out of the world," he said. "So we construct meaningful worlds for ourselves." Schwartzberg categorized his interviewees' view on HIV and AIDS as shattered meaning, high meaning, defensive meaning and irrelevant meaning. "Those who have shattered meaning are emersed in a world of loss," he said. "The high meaning group transforms despair to challenge." The defense meaning group expressed contradictory reactions to being HIV positive, and the irrelevant meaning group viewed HIV as trivial, he said. Schwartzberg said that these views may change over time although he does not see a trend, from his findings, that longer exposure to the virus moves a patient higher up to optimism upon being HIV positive. "The process of finding meaning is an on-going and developmental one," he said. Audience members said they thought that the presentation was special and meaningful. "It was right on the target," Richard Moeau, a 1986 College graduate said. "I haven't heard any other presentation that looks at the individual psychological level." Another thought that it was very acurate. "I've lost a lot of friends through AIDS," T.J. Tokes, a 1966 graduate said. "A lot of what he said was true."

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.