Uncertain intimacies: Intoxication, consent, and moral judgment among young adults

How do young adults negotiate consent and responsibility in sexual encounters involving intoxication? Drawing on 31 qualitative interviews with young adults in the Greater Stockholm area, this article conceptualizes such encounters as situations in which taken-for-granted moral orientation may become destabilized. Participants described uncertainty about intentions, consent, responsibility, and the meaning of events, especially where memory loss, uneven intoxication, or unclear reciprocity were involved. To navigate this uncertainty, they relied on practical moral heuristics, including distinctions between being “tipsy” versus “too drunk,” the “dead-drunk” taboo, and ideals of intoxication parity or being on the “same level.” These heuristics translated uncertain internal states into workable social cues for judging fairness, vulnerability, and legitimacy, yet were also shaped by gendered sexual scripts. The article contributes to moral sociology by theorizing moral judgment as a situated accomplishment under conditions of uncertainty.