Early Maladaptive Schemas, Sexual Self-esteem, and Anxiety in Women with Orgasmic Disorders

Abstract

Background: Individual factors that can lead to psychological disorders, including early maladaptive schemas, sexual self-esteem, and anxiety, and their impact on the female orgasmic disorder (FOD), has not yet been thoroughly examined. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to compare these factors in women with FOD to those without the condition. Methods: This descriptive research was causal-comparative or ex post facto study, and the statistical population was two groups of married women aged 18 to 40 years. Out of 152 women who participated, 66 cases had FOD, and 86 cases had no FOD according to the cut-off scores of the Female Sexual Function Index questionnaire and based on the DSM5 criteria. The Young Early Maladaptive Schema questionnaire (YEMSQ) (1995), Zeanah and Schwarz’s Sexual Self-esteem Inventory for Women (SSEI-W) (1996), and the Beck Anxiety inventory (BAI) (1988) were filled out by all the participants. An independent t-test at a significance level of P < 0.05 was applied to analyze the data using SPSS 24. Results: The results indicated that the mean scores of women with FOD were significantly higher in all schema areas than the mean scores of women without FOD (P < 0.001), and the mean scores of women without FOD were significantly higher on the sexual self-esteem scale and all its sub-scales than those with FOD (P < 0.001). Also, the mean anxiety scores of women with FOD were significantly higher than the mean scores of women without FOD (P < 0.001). Conclusions: These results support the differences in individual psychological factors among women with FOD and those without and can be used for education, prevention, evaluation, and treatment of orgasmic disorders.