Abstract: The purpose of this dissertation was to develop and validate a measure of sexual initiation strategies. Specifically, this research sought to investigate existing sexual scripts as they pertain to sexual initiation strategies through the lens of sexual script theory. Sexual scripts were as examined as both internalized and communicated concepts. As internalized sexual scripts influence how individuals view themselves and as communicated sexual scripts influence how individuals project themselves to others. As such, individual sexual tactics were grouped into specific strategies and relationships between these strategies and both individual and relational variables were examined. In order to develop a measure to test sexual strategies, three separate studies were conducted. The first study utilized a free-elicitation procedure to determine current sexual initiation tactics being employed by individuals today. These tactics were conceptually reduced to create a list of representative tactics. The second study was designed to determine the groupings of the individual tactics to determine sexual strategies. Through exploratory factor analysis, a five factor structure was obtained. The five factors were; direct talk, indirect talk, verbal coercion, nonverbal coercion, and covert physical acts. Additionally, the second study examined sex differences between the various sexual strategies factors. Surprisingly, results indicate that women use more of the sexual strategies than do men, with the exception of verbal coercion. These findings indicate that the sex roles associated with the sexual script are changing. The final survey based study explored associations between the sexual strategies scale and both individual and relational variables. Script theory asserts that individuals derive their sexual scripts from individual, societal, and relational levels. Analysis of the data found that overall individual variables are more predictive of sexual strategy choice than are relational variables. These findings suggest that unlike previous conceptualizations of sexual script formation, with regards to sexual initiation strategies specifically, individual characteristics are substantially more influential than relational characteristics.