Understanding Sex and Sexualities

1. Understanding Sex and Sexualities Chapter 6

2. Chapter Outline • Sexual Scripts • How Do We Learn about Sex? • Sexuality in Adolescence and Young Adulthood • Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Identities • Sexuality in Adulthood • Adult Sexual Behavior • Sexual Expression and Relationships • Sexual Problems and Dysfunctions • Issues Resulting from Sexual Involvement • Sexual Responsibility

3. Sexual Scripts • Expectations of how to behave sexually. • A sexual script enables individuals to organize sexual situations and interpret emotions and sensations as sexually meaningful. • We may modify or change our scripts, but we will not throw them away. • The scripts we are “given” for sexual behavior tend to be traditional.

4. Traditional Male Sexual Scripts • Men should not have (or express) certain feelings. • Performance is the thing that counts. • The man is in charge. • A man always wants sex and is ready for it. • All physical contact leads to sex. • Sex equals intercourse. • Sexual intercourse always leads to orgasm.

5. Traditional Female Sexual Scripts • Sex is both good and bad. • Girls don’t want to know about their bodies “down there.” • Sex is for men. • Men should know what women want. • Women shouldn’t talk about sex. • Women should look like models. • There is only one right way to experience orgasm.

6. Contemporary Sexual Scripts • Sexual expression is positive. • Sexual activities are a mutual exchange of erotic pleasure. • Sexuality is equally involving of both partners, and the partners are equally responsible.

7. Contemporary Sexual Scripts • Legitimate sexual activities are not limited to sexual intercourse but also include masturbation and oral-genital sex. • Sexual activities may be initiated by either partner. • Both partners have a right to experience orgasm, through intercourse, oral genital sex, or manual stimulation.

8. Contemporary Sexual Scripts • Nonmarital sex is acceptable within a relationship context. • Gay, lesbian, and bisexual relationships are increasingly accepted, especially on college campuses and in large cities.

9. How Do We Learn About Sex? • Parental Influence • Children learn a great deal about sexuality from their parents. • They learn both because their parents set out to teach them and because they are avid observers of their parents’ behavior. • Peer Influence • Adolescents garner a wealth of information, as well as much misinformation, from one another about sex. • They often put pressure on one another to carry out traditional gender roles.

10. The various mass media profoundly affect our sexual attitudes and may also affect our sexual choices and behaviors Media Influence

12. Sexual Development: Adolescence and Young Adulthood • Several tasks challenge young adults as they develop their sexuality: • Establishing a sexual orientation. • Integrating love and sex. • Forging intimacy and commitment. • Making fertility/childbearing decisions. • Developing a sexual philosophy.

13. Percentage of High School Students Who Ever Had Sexual Intercourse, by Sex and Race/Ethnicity, 2007

14. Percentage of High School Students Who Were Currently Sexually Active, by Sex and Race/Ethnicity, 2007

15. The Meaning of Virginity Loss • Laura Carpenter’s research suggests that people draw upon three themes to make sense of their lost virginity: • Virginity as a gift. • Virginity as a stigma. • Virginity loss as part of the transition to adulthood.

16. Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Identities • In contemporary America, people are classified as heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual. • The percentage of the population that is lesbian, gay, or bisexual is not known. • Among women, about 11% have had sexual experience with other women, but only about 1% or 2% identify as lesbians. • Among males as many as 5% to 8% have had oral or anal sex with other males, but only about 2% or 3% identify as homosexual.

17. Stages in Acquiring a Lesbian or Gay Identity • Fear and suspicion that one’s desires are different from those of others. • Labeling feelings of attraction, love, and desire as homoerotic if they recur often.. • The person’s self-definition as lesbian or gay. • Entering the gay subculture. • First lesbian or gay love affair.

18. Two significant factors in identifying sexual orientation are: the gender of one’s partner the label one gives oneself (lesbian, gay, bisexual, or heterosexual). Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Identities

19. Gay and Lesbian Relationships Compared with Heterosexual Relationships • In many ways, same-sex couples want, experience, and struggle with many of the same things as heterosexual couples • Major areas of difference have been identified in: • importance attached to gender and gender role behavior • Presence or absence of role models for healthy relationships • resolution of difficulties • sexual behavior

20. Antigay Prejudice and Discrimination • Antigay prejudice • a strong dislike, fear, or hatred of lesbians and gay men because of their homosexuality. • Homophobia • an irrational or phobic fear of gay men and lesbians • Heterosexism • bias and/or discrimination in favor of heterosexuals.

21. Bisexuality • Bisexuals are individuals attracted to members of both genders. • Bisexual women and men go through four stages in developing their identity • Initial confusion • Finding and applying the bisexual label • Settling into the identity • Continued uncertainty

22. Sexuality in Adulthood • Developmental Tasks in Middle Adulthood • Redefining sex in marital or other long-term relationships • Reevaluating sexuality • Accepting the biological aging process

25. Psychosexual Development in Later Adulthood • Many of the psychosexual tasks older Americans must undertake are directly related to the aging process: • Changing sexuality • Loss of partner

26. Adult Sexual Behavior • Autoeroticism • Sexual activities such as sexual fantasies, masturbation, and erotic dreams that involve only the self • Interpersonal Sexuality • Touching • Kissing • Oral–Genital Sex • Sexual Intercourse • Anal Eroticism

28. Sexual Expression and Relationships • Sexuality exists in various relationship contexts that may influence our feelings and activities. • Nonmarital sex • encompasses sexual activities that take place outside of marriage. • Extramarital sex • sexual interactions that take place outside the marital relationship between at least one married partner

30. Marital Sexuality • Monogamy • Within marriage, all sexual interactions are expected to take place between the spouses. • Socially Sanctioned Reproduction • In most segments of society, marriage remains the more socially approved setting for having children. • Changed Sexual Context • Sexual intercourse must be arranged around working hours and at times when the children are at school or asleep.

33. Sexual Enhancement • Different individuals report different conditions for good sex. More common conditions include the following: • Feeling intimate with your partner • Feeling sexually capable • Feeling trust • Feeling aroused • Feeling physically and mentally alert • Feeling positive about the environment and situation

34. Sexual problems can become self-fulfilling, as they can cause performance anxiety or a fear of future failures to achieve erections or experience orgasms. Sexual Problems and Dysfunctions

36. Americans are in the middle of the worst epidemic of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in our history. There are an estimated 19 million new cases of STIs in the United States each year, the highest rate of infection of any industrialized nation in the world Issues Resulting from Sexual Involvement