Archives Of Sexual Behavior Research Articles

New Trends in Same-Sex Sexual Contact for American Adolescents?

A new analysis of the U.S. National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG), comparing 2002 data to 2006-2008 data, found notable changes in teen girls’ sexual behavior. Seventeen-year-old girls in the later cohort were significantly less likely to have been heterosexually active (63% v. 46%) and more than twice as likely to have had same-sex contact (5% v. 11%). This group of teens was also more than three times as likely to have used emergency contraception (5% v. 17%) and less likely to have been pregnant (18% v. 12%). Additionally, the percentage of 17-year-old American girls who had ever been pregnant dropped significantly. Factors that may account for this drop include findings that more were waiting until later in adolescence to become heterosexually involved, more were using emergency contraception if they were heterosexually active, and more were engaging in same-sex behavior. Future research will help determine if this data constitutes a long-term trend. Findings were published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, in a letter to the editor titled “New Trends in Same-Sex Contact for American Adolescents?” The study was conducted by Nanette Gartrell, MD, Henny Bos, PhD (University of Amsterdam), and Naomi Goldberg, MPP (a Fellow at the Williams Institute during the time that this work was done). Principal investigator Nanette Gartrell, MD, is a 2011-12 Williams Institute Visiting Distinguished Scholar and also affiliated with the University of Amsterdam.

Erratum to: Pornography and Sex Crimes in the Czech Republic

Erratum to: Arch Sex Behav (2011) 40:1037–1043DOI 10.1007/s10508-010-9696-yThere is mistake in the sentence‘‘Considering the completepost1989period,thenumberofreportedrapesdidnotincreaseafter SEM was legalized ( t=6.7, df =35, p\.001).’’ Thestatistical values belonged to child sex crime data (the valueswere doubled). The appropriate statistical value for number ofreported rapes is t=-1.3, df =35, ns.

Point: a call for proper usage of “gender” and “sex” in biomedical publications

the term “gender” became popular among sociologists, psychologists, and sex researchers in the 1970s as a means to differentiate biological differences between men and women (sex differences) and differences due to socialization experiences (gender differences), or the act of having sex (e.g., [

Factors that Influence Sexual Arousal in Men: A Focus Group Study

The goal of this study was to improve our understanding of men's sexual response and its components as well as the factors or types of situations that men describe as facilitating or interfering with sexual arousal. Six focus groups, involving 50 mostly white, heterosexual men (M age = 35.2 years; range, 18-70), were conducted. As it was previously found in women (Graham, Sanders, Milhausen, & McBride, Archives of Sexual Behavior, 33, 527-538, 2004), men described a wide range of physical (genital as well as nongenital) and cognitive/affective cues for sexual arousal. Also, men described the relationship between sexual desire and arousal as being variable and complex, presented a wide range of factors that increased or decreased sexual arousal, and showed substantial variability in both the importance and direction of their effects. The findings may help further development of models of sexual response and inform discussions about gender differences in sexual desire and arousal.

Childhood Sexual Abuse and Adult Sexual Dysfunction: Response to Commentary by Rind and Tromovitch (2007)

Rind and Tromovitch (2007) raised four concerns relating to our article (Najman, Dunne, Purdie, Boyle, & Coxeter, 2005. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 34, 517-526.) which suggested a causal association between childhood sexual abuse (CSA) and adult sexual dysfunction. We consider each of these concerns: magnitude of effect, cause and effect, confounding, and measurement error. We suggest that, while the concerns they raise represent legitimate reservations about the validity of our findings, on balance the available evidence indicates an association between CSA and sexual dysfunction that is of "moderate" magnitude, probably causal, and unlikely to be a consequence of confounding or measurement error.

Transsexuals and Pseudotranssexuals

SUMMARY This article was first published in Archives of Sexual Behavior, vol. 7, no. 4, 1978, pp. 263–272. Prince admits to being attracted by the idea of sex reassignment for herself at the time of the publicity given to the case of Christine Jorgensen. However, the development of her philosophy that the central issues were to do with gender (the psycho-social) and not sex (anatomy and physiology) leads her to the view that it is perfectly possible for a male to be a woman without having sex surgery. She speaks out forcefully against sex reassignment, arguing that it is not appropriate for nine out of ten of those requesting it and writes of “so-called” or pseudo transsexuals. Susceptible transvestites are seduced by the publicity given to the topic into thinking it is the solution to their problems.

Implicit Association Test: Separating Transsituationally Stable and Variable Components of Attitudes toward Gay Men

Implicit Association Test: Separating Transsituationally Stable and Variable Components of Attitudes toward Gay Men

Gender, Sexual Dysfunctions, and the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy

The purpose of this study is to examine male and female sexual dysfunctions present in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy . The Journal of Sex Research , the Journal of Sex Education and Therapy , and the Archives of Sexual Behavior also are briefly discussed. The types of dysfunctions investigated include female orgasmic disorder, female sexual arousal disorder, male erectile disorder, and premature ejaculation. The results indicate that the focus has shifted to male sexual dysfunctions. Specifically, there is greater attention paid to erectile dysfunction. The implications of these findings are discussed.

A 30 Years' Thank You

The Archives of Sexual Behavior: An Interdisciplinary Research Journal will attempt to bring together findings from the several academic disciplines investigating human sexuality. Research data on sexual behavior are emerging at an accelerating rate. Inspection of the past year’s Index Medicus and Psychological Abstracts reveals hundreds of noteworthy papers published throughout the world addressed directly to this subject. They were from psychologists, psychiatrists, neuroendocrinologists, ethologists, psychoanalysts, geneticists, and social scientists. Unfortunately for the student of sexual behavior, these papers were published in literally dozens of journals, rendering it a practical impossibility to maintain a scholarly awareness of that material. An additional deficiency in effective communication among these investigators derives from man’s inefficient system of language. Of the scores of innovative papers published last year, one-third were in a variety of languages other than English. The Archives of Sexual Behavior hopes to be the first journal to collate effectively research contributions of consistently high caliber from scholars throughout the world. It hopes to incorporate, among others, the research strategies of the clinician, including the psychoanalyst and behavior therapist, with the perspective of the social scientist and the findings of the laboratory investigator. Associate Editors and members of the Editorial Board have been selected to maximize this potential. The Archives of Sexual Behavior will also translate selected non-English-language research papers and make them available in summary form to an English-language readership. How did I become Founding Editor in 1971? I was chosen because of the fatherly confidence of Robert Stoller and the confidence that Seymour Weingarten had in Bob. Seymour had been Bob’s editor at Science House when Sex and

The Medicalization of Male Sexual Dysfunctions: An Analysis of Sex Therapy Journals

This study explored paradigm change in sex therapy for male sexual dysfunctions. An analysis of the professional journal literature was used to examine the theories, causes, and treatments utilized to explain and treat erectile dysfunction and premature ejaculation between 1967 and 1998. The journals analyzed include the Journal of Sex Education and Therapy, the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, the Journal of Sex Research, and Archives of Sexual Behavior. Sex therapy may be characterized as a multiple paradigm science; the medical and psychological models are reviewed. The medical model includes various approaches such as hormone therapy, herbs, prescription medication, surgery, and vacuum therapy. While the behavioral model is the dominant psychological sex therapy paradigm, the results indicate that the medical model has emerged as the dominant paradigm for the treatment of male sexual dysfunctions. These findings suggest several possibilities for sex therapy: a decline of practitioners without medical...

Literature update: A critical review

Abstract Can perfectionism contribute to marital and sexual dysfunction? The examination of a range of variables that may have an effect between degrees of perfectionism in a man or his partner and marital satisfaction and sexual functioning is reported (MARTEN DI BARTOLO, P. & BARLOW, D.H. (1996) Perfectionism, marital satisfaction and contributing factors to sexual dysfunction in men with erectile disorder and their spouses, Archives of Sexual Behavior, 25, pp. 581-588). Perfectionism was measured using the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS) and measure of marital satisfaction by the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS). Rating scores of organicity and psychogenicity contribution towards erectile dysfunction using various criteria and different clinicians for each rating were obtained. Higher overall levels of perfectionism were found to be associated with high clinician ratings with regard to the influence of psychogenic variables in contributing to dysfunctional men's erectile difficulties. Neither d...

Visual cues to female physical attractiveness.

Evolutionary psychology suggests that a woman's sexual attractiveness is based on cues of health and reproductive potential. In recent years, research has focused on the ratio of the width of the waist to the width of the hips (the waist-to-hip ratio (WHR). A low WHR (i.e. a curvaceous body) is believed to correspond to the optimal fat distribution for high fertility, and so this shape should be highly attractive. In this paper we present evidence that weight scaled for height (the body mass index (BMI)) is the primary determinant of sexual attractiveness rather than WHR. BMI is also strongly linked to health and reproductive potential. Furthermore, we show how covariation of apparent BMI and WHR in previous studies led to the overestimation of the importance of WHR in the perception of female attractiveness. Finally, we show how visual cues, such as the perimeter-area ratio (PAR), can provide an accurate and reliable index of an individual's BMI and could be used by an observer to differentiate between potential partners.

Literature update: A critical review

Can perfectionism contribute to marital and sexual dysfunction? The examination of a range of variables that may have an effect between degrees of perfectionism in a man or his partner and marital satisfaction and sexual functioning is reported (MARTEN DI BARTOLO, P. & BARLOW, D.H. (1996) Perfectionism, marital satisfaction and contributing factors to sexual dysfunction in men with erectile disorder and their spouses, Archives of Sexual Behavior, 25, pp. 581-588). Perfectionism was measured using the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (MPS) and measure of marital satisfaction by the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS). Rating scores of organicity and psychogenicity contribution towards erectile dysfunction using various criteria and different clinicians for each rating were obtained. Higher overall levels of perfectionism were found to be associated with high clinician ratings with regard to the influence of psychogenic variables in contributing to dysfunctional men's erectile difficulties. Neither dysfunctional men's nor their spouses' marital satisfaction scores were correlated with psychogenic ratings. Dysfunctional men's overall MPS scores were not related to either their own or their partner's DAS scores, although dysfunctional partners' MPS scores were negatively related to both their own and their partner's DAS scores. This is preliminary evidence that women's but not men's perfectionist tendencies affect both their own and their spouses' marital satisfaction. The MPS scores were significantly higher in women than in men, suggesting that women may be exhibiting perfectionist tendencies to a degree that begins to impact adversely upon relationship satisfaction.

Homosexuality in men and number of older brothers

This study investigated whether homosexual men have a higher mean birth order than heterosexual men primarily because they have more older brothers or because they have more older siblings of both sexes. For the main analyses, 302 heterosexual men were individually matched on year of birth with an equal number of heterosexual men. Each completed a self-administered, anonymous questionnaire concerning family background and other biodemographic information. Logistic regression analysis showed that homosexuality was positively correlated with the proband's number of older brothers but not with older sisters, younger brothers, younger sisters, or parental age at the time of the proband's birth. Each additional older brother increased the odds of homosexuality by 33%. These results restrict the range of possible theories of the birth order phenomenon to those that can explain not only why older brothers increase the probability of homosexuality in later-born males but also why older sisters neither enhance this effect nor counteract it.

Gender discrimination in biological motion displays based on dynamic cues

Studies of human locomotion have found that male and female walkers differ in terms of lateral body sway, with males tending to swing their shoulders from side to side more than their hips, and females tending to swing their hips more than their shoulders. Experiments reported here demonstrate that naive viewers can identify the gender of the figure in a biological motion display very reliably when the display contains gender-specific lateral body sway. Sensitivity to gender is high even for displays containing only a fraction of a step cycle. This dynamic cue dominates structural cues based on torso shape (`centre-of-moment9) when the cues are set in opposition. It is mediated by gender-specific differences in the velocity of shoulder and hip dots, not by positional differences in shoulder and hip dots during the step cycle.

The effects of the z-score transformation on measures of relative erectile response strength: A re-appraisal

In studies of stimulus control of sexual arousal, some researchers transform raw data to z-scores. Earls, Quinsey and Castonguay [ Archives of Sexual Behavior, 16, 493–500 (1987)] have argued that the proportion of variance due to stimulus presentations was greater in z-scores than in the raw data or in a percent score. We present analyses of sexual arousal data that show that z-score transformations may distort the information inherent in the raw data and may increase random error. In addition, we present Monte Carlo analyses indicating that the z-score transformation compromises the estimates of Type I error, and, depending on specific circumstances, sometimes increases and sometimes decreases the power of the statistical test. Transformation of raw data to percent of full erection does not distort the information in the raw data, does not compromise the data analyses and, therefore, is the preferred transformation.

Perceptions of sexual violations: Denying a kiss, stealing a kiss

The purpose of this investigation was to compare female and male perceptions of interactants in scenes involving a “minor” sexual violation—one in which a male denies consent for a kiss and a woman kisses him regardless, and another in which a woman denies consent and a man kisses her regardless. Undergraduate students (n = 387—approximately 82.5% White, 11% Black, 4.7% Hispanic, 1% Native American, and .8% other) completed scenarios adapted from L. Margolin [(1990) “Gender and the Stolen Kiss: The Social Support of Males and Females to Violate a Partner's Sexual Consenting Noncoercive Situation,” Archives of Sexual Behavior, Vol. 19, pp. 281–291], and evaluated scenario interactants using two sets of semantic differential items and two open-ended questions. Results of several analyses indicated that, first and most importantly, violators' behaviors are considered less acceptable, more negatively aggressive, more complimenting, and less appropriate than deniers' behaviors. Second, violations of sex-role expectations (i.e., female aggressing and male denying consent) are seen as less predictable and more complimenting than interactions where sex role expectations are not violated. Finally, minor distinctions between female and male respondents also were found. In general, findings support Margolin's conclusion that women have more social support than men for determining their sexual behavior and extend his findings to private interactions where motivations are not explicit. Also, trust was found to be an important factor defining perceptions of “minor” sexual violations, which raises the possibility that an initiation of a kiss and a violation of consent are viewed as different actions.

The attitudes toward forcible date rape (FDR) scale: Development of a measurement model

Using data from 341 female and 237 male college students that were collected previously (Fischer, G. J.,Archives of Sexual Behavior, 15, 457–466, 1986), several true score measurement models were used to describe the variance-covariance structure of a nine-item attitude toward a forcible date rape (FDR) scale. The congeneric true score model fit the data best, but not satisfactorily. By deleting “noncongeneric” items, a six-item, unweighted linear composite variable based on the congeneric true score model was shown to fit the data, and reliabilities and validities based on this model proved satisfactory for females, males, and the total sample. The factor structure of the model for females and for males was not equivalent, but the general patterns were similar. Suggestions for further research included a validation study of the six-item scale on an independent sample and a comparison of 5-and 7-point Likert response scales to see if the lack of model equivalence by gender could be due, in part, to more variability in attitudes toward forcible date rape in men than women.

Hispanic and majority student attitudes toward forcible date rape as a function of differences in attitudes toward women

Less rejecting attitudes toward forcible date rape are related to more traditional attitudes toward women, as measured by the Attitudes Toward Women Scale (G. J. Fischer, “College Student Attitudes Toward Forcible Date Rape. I. Cognitive Predictors,” Archives of Sexual Behavior, 1986, 15, 457–466). Does this relation reflect more traditional or more negative attitudes toward women? If the former, then an ethnic minority having still more traditional attitudes toward women (than the nonethnic majority), also should be less rejecting of forcible date rape. This hypothesis was assessed by surveying attitudes of bicultural and bilingual Hispanic, other self-reported Hispanics, and nonethnic majority college students from a large introductory sociology class in a large Southwestern university. Results showed that Hispanics, overall, (1) had more traditional attitudes toward women than nonethnic majority and (2) as hypothesized, had less rejecting attitudes toward forcible date rape. However, these effects were not a simple function of ethnicity, at least not for males. For example, bicultural and bilingual Hispanic males were least likely to blame the male for the forcible date rape, but were no less rejecting of such behavior than other Hispanic males and had no more traditional attitudes toward women than other Hispanic or majority males. Bicultural and bilingual Hispanic females, on the other hand, were most likely to blame the male, had the least rejecting attitudes toward date rape, and had the most traditional attitudes toward women. one interpretation is that exposure to less restrictive sex roles of the majority culture is a liberating influence on Hispanic females, but not on Hispanic males who, perhaps, see more liberal attitudes toward women as having no or even negative payoff. Differences found between Hispanics who are bicultural and bilingual and other self-reported Hispanics suggest that these groups should not be combined, and that a research sample needs to be defined more specifically than “Hispanic.”

The International Academy of Sex Research: in the beginning.

I am delighted to return to Cambridge University and to Caius College where, through the good offices of Joe Herbert , I was privileged to spend a sabbatical year. But this pleasure is overshadowed by a n o t h e r t h i s meeting marks the first decade of the International Academy of Sex Research. Attending this meeting is very significant for me. It was also difficult. To be here, I sacrificed lecture and study time from my first weeks as a student at the Yale Law School. Only somewhat confused in this new venture when I left two days ago, I expect to be totally bewildered when I return two days hence. But whatever the course of ms; career during the hext years, I will always reflect with pride on two professional accomplishments. These are paramount to me because they are my l egac ies they will live beyond my hour upon this s t a g e or the grander one. One accomplishment was the founding of the journal, Archives of Sexual Behavior. The other was the founding of the organization, the International Academy of Sex Research. At last year's meeting, the ninth, it became apparent to me that the Academy had come of age. It is so well established and "taken for granted" that many newer members know little of its inception. At that meeting, individual members told me they had just learned that I had "started this whole thing." I was shocked, realizing that history becomes "ancient" so quickly. This, then, is a good time for memorializing the inception of the Academy. Why and how was it started? Who were the first members? What were the earliest goals? In the beginning, there was the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex. Then there was the American Association of Sex Educators, Counselors, and TheraNsts. (I saw them and said thev were not "~ood.") These or~anizations'