Many people have trouble identifying themselves as asexual, sexual or they are just not sure. The following study was done in order to examine the number of asexual individuals in a confined group of people. The goal of the study or experiment was to analyze reasons behind people identifying themselves as being asexual. Asexuality is identifying oneself as not being attracted to anyone at all. Thus, eliminating the thought of sexual behaviors such as, but not limited to, frequency of touching/petting/kissing, masturbation, intercourse and arousal. In the hypothesis of the experiment, the experimenters predicted scores on desire domain for both men and women to be comparable to available data with hypoactive sexual desire disorder (HSDD).
A recent study of 18,000 individuals done in the United Kingdom indicated that 1% of the population identified themselves as asexual. The primary aim of the study was to further characterize asexual individuals on the basis of sexual, interpersonal, personal, and psychopathology measures. To conduct the experiment, researchers allowed participants to self-identify themselves as asexual. Independent variables included the age and the gender of the participants. The dependent variables were displayed as being asexual and the questions being asked on the surveys taken. The participants where chosen from the AVEN website, a website found by David Jay, devoted to those who identify themselves as asexual. AVEN is the world’s largest self-identified asexual community. The experiment was done using 187 participants who indicated their gender—54 men and 133 women. The average age of the participants were 30.1 years for men and 28.2 years for women.
Participants were asked to complete demographic infor...
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... no per-prediction numbers were shown) the results were not relatable to the hypothesis. The follow up study done by the same researchers followed the previous participants to come in for an interview to ask for the change that may have taken place after the first experiment. Only 15 participants were selected depending on the response time of the e-mail sent out to all previous participants. Participants were invited to share their own definition of asexuality. They were asked to explain sexual and non-sexual experiences or behaviors to solidify their answers. As results showed, there was a lack of sexual attraction in the answers of nearly all participants.
In conclusion, the participants before and after the experiments had the same thought about asexuality. The lack of being sexually attracted seems to be the main cause although sexual arousal still occurred.
This might be because it is assumed that people who fall under this category are not curious about sexual education. People who are asexual do not experience sexual attraction. However, if someone is confused about their sexuality, it could be important to provide facts on this sexuality to narrow down one’s options. The subtopic “What if I don’t ever want to have sex with anyone?” explains more about sex drives. “People have different sex drives and they can change over time — so don 't worry.” This is a step in the right direction for asexuality education, and it can help people identify with the right
Masters and Johnson were a pioneering team in the field of human sexuality, both in the domains of research and therapy. William Howell Masters, a gynecologist, was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1915. Virginia Eshelman Johnson, a psychologist, was born in Springfield, Montana in 1925. To fully appreciate their contribution, it is necessary to see their work in historic context. In 1948, Alfred C. Kinsey and his co-workers, responding to a request by female students at Indiana University for more information on human sexual behavior, published the book Sexual Behavior in the Human Male. They followed this five years later with Sexual Behavior in the Human Female. These books began a revolution in social awareness of and public attention given to human sexuality. At the time, public morality severely restricted open discussion of sexuality as a human characteristic, and specific sexual practices, especially sexual behaviors that did not lead to procreation. Kinsey's books, which among other things reported findings on the frequency of various sexual practices including homosexuality, caused a furor. Some people felt that the study of sexual behavior would undermine the family structure and damage American society. It was in this climate - one of incipient efforts to break through the denial of human sexuality and considerable resistance to these efforts - that Masters and Johnson began their work. Their primary contribution has been to help define sexuality as a healthy human trait and the experience of great pleasure and deep intimacy during sex as socially acceptable goals. As a physician interested in the nature of sexuality and the sexual experience, William Masters wanted to conduct research that would lead to an objective understanding of these topics. In 1957, he hired Virgina Johnson as a research assistant to begin this research issue. Together they developed polygraph-like instruments that were designed to measure human sexual response. Using these tools, Masters and Johnson initiated a project that ultimately included direct laboratory observation and measurement of 700 men and women while they were having intercourse or masturbating. Based on the data collected in this study, they co-authored the book Human Sexual Response in 1966. In this book, they identify and describe four phases in the human sexual response cycle : excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution. By this point in time, the generally repressive attitude toward sexuality was beginning to lift and the book found a ready audience.
It was not until Kinsey et al. (1953) developed the Kinsey Scale to measure sexual orientation that the notion of sexual fluidity began to be considered in Western cultures. It consisted of a seven-category continuum based on two indicators: sexual fantasy and sexual experience. Both fantasy and experimental measures were found to have similar result, and many agreed this form of measurement was better than one consisting of only a few discrete variables (Ellis, Burke, & Ames, 1987).
Bisexuality is a psychological phenomenon that is still relatively inconclusive. Many people in society today are convinced that bisexuality is not even real, that bisexuality is simply a phase, and that it should not even be counted as a sexual orientation. The studies, tests, and data collected by researchers of the bisexual community have had difficulty being generalized based upon the variety and diversity of those who identify as bisexual. In early psychology, methods such as the Kinsey scale became helpful to determine a person 's sexual orientation based on a 0-6 ranking. However, the Kinsey Scale is based on sexual encounters and behavior with members of the same sex, rather than questioning the the emotional and
Milstein, Susan A. Taking Sides Clashing Views in Human Sexuality. Ed. William J. Taverner and Ryan W. McKee. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2009. Print.
Despite the large collection of literature of sexuality that has been accumulating, human asexuality has been largely ignored. Asexuality is controversially considered to be a sexual orientation and people who identify as asexual are people who typically do not experience sexual attraction (Asexuality Visibility and Education Network, 2013). Though research on sex and sexual orientations has been done for centuries, the first real suggestion that there might be people who fall outside of the heterosexual – homosexual orientation spectrum came from Kinsey and colleagues in 1948. These individuals were put into a separate category and were identified as having no erotic response to hetero- or homosexual stimuli, but otherwise they were largely ignored by the researchers (Kinsey, 1953). Later, researchers linked asexuality with negative traits and pathologies, including depression and lower self-esteem (Masters, Johnson, & Kolodny, 1986; Nuius, 1983). An issue with these studies, however, is that the researchers defined asexuality in a way that most current asexuals do not agree with. For example, in a study done by Bell and Weinberg (1978), there were references made to asexual homosexuals who simply hid their homosexuality. Many asexuals, otherwise known as Aces, would struggle with this definition because homosexuality implies a type of sexual attraction: attraction to your same sex. Because Aces typically do not feel sexual attraction to anyone or anything, they should not be classified under the same label as a closeted homosexual. Another issue is that none of these studies actually focused on asexuality. Instead, they were added on the side and generally ignored.
Sexuality is a fundamental part of our self-discovery, involving much more than just being genetically or anatomically male and female and it is not defined solely by one 's sexual acts (Ministry of Education 1989, p.79 cited in Gourlay, P 1995). The notion that sexuality is fixed and innate disregards the social aspects that impact ones’ sexualities. Gagnon and Simon (1973) further commented that sexuality is a feature of social
Genetics, biology, and upbringing are all key aspects in determining one’s sexual orientation. Many of the factors are combined to make up how a person feels or who he or she is attracted to. There is no definite answer to why someone has a particular orientation, but there are studies that sugge...
Many of us have been reflecting on questions about intersex and what it actually is. I’ll be explaining the definition of intersex, how common it is the conditions of intersex and what is basically considered to be intersex. Intersex is when a person is born with a sexual anatomy or reproductive system that doesn’t quite fit the description of male or female. Some examples are, a person could be born with an outer appearance as a female but could have male anatomy on the inside. Also a person can be born with what looks to be as both male and female genitals, such as, a boy can be born with a small penis or a scrotum that’s divided forming what can look like a labia or a girl can be born with a very large clitoris or even not having a vaginal opening. Then there’s the gene mix up. A person can be born with mosaic genetics which means that some of her cells have xx chromosomes and some have XY chromosomes.
Thesis: In a society ruled by hypersexulaity, asexuals are often depicted as freaks with a mental or physical disabilities, however
The method was used in this study, half women and half men participants in the sexual orientation nonverbal test. All dyads consist of individuals of the identical sex. All homosexual participants were conscious of their own sexual
Oliver, M. B., & Hyde, J. S. (1993). Gender difference in sexuality: A meta-analysis. Psychological Bulletin, 114, 29-51.
Just like Alfred Kinsey said “The world is not divided into sheep and goats. Not all things are black nor all things white.” The world is divided into people that want many different things in life, everyone has a different opinion and mind set on what they want. Some people have other beliefs and values than other people, so we cannot judge them for being themselves. I believe that sexuality is the way that you express yourself through sex, or sexual actions. There are many factors that go into sexuality. I mainly learned about how sex worked through my health and child development classes. There were other things that contributed to my knowledge on sex, those were media, talking with friends or people at school, and my family values. How I think about sex is greatly impacted by these factors, some factors impacted me more than others but all of them still have an impact on my beliefs today.
In order to discuss the biology of gender identity and sexual orientation, it is necessary to first examine the differences between multiple definitions that are often mistakenly interchanged: sex, gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity. Sexual orientation is defined by LeVay (2011) as “the trait that predisposes us to experience sexual attraction to people of the same sex as ourselves, to persons of the other sex, or to both sexes” (p. 1). The typical categories of sexual orientation are homosexual, heterosexual and bisexual. Vrangalova and Savin-Williams (2012) found that most people identify as heterosexual, but there are also groups of people that identify as mostly heterosexual and mostly gay within the three traditional categories (p. 89). This is to say that there are not three concrete groups, but sexual orientation is a continuum and one can even fluctuate on it over time. LeVay (2011) also defines gender as “the ...
Then we have sexual behavior: what sex are your partners? And finally, we have sexual identity: how do you think of yourself are you gay, straight, or bisexual? Some of us develop feelings of attraction to a one type of sex before we self-label our sexual identity. Others engage in sexual behavior before they’re sure how they want to self-identify. There’s no standard for how sexual orientation emerges, and it can often be a fluid process, with attraction, behavior, and identity changing over time (Burriss, 2015). Attraction occurs in adolescence and can occur with a first romance or first sexual experience. It is common for adolescents to experience same-sex attractions. Some gay youth experience opposite-sex attractions, sometimes before same-sex attractions. Teens are moving toward forming their own sexual orientation and identity. Previous studies report that more than 60% of the boys acknowledged opposite-sex attractions and 80% of same-sex–attracted girls. Boys reported that the start of heterosexual attractions happened around the same age as same-sex attractions and occurring usually one to two years earlier than girls. They become overly concerned with whether they are attractive and place more importance on their peer group. Many adolescents may even fall in love for the first time. It is common to experiment sexual and many will have intercourse during adolescence (Kaufman & Tulloch,