Measuring sexual arousal

The impact of sexual offenses and abuse is incalculable, both on the victims themselves and the society responsible for protecting them. Identifying people who sexually offend against adults and children and preventing them from engaging in abusive behavior in the future requires valid and reliable methods that accurately identify the perpetrators' characteristics and measure treatment effectiveness. This article reviews the literature on penile plethysmography (PPG), a mechanism by which erectile response to deviant sexual stimuli can be measured.     

Measuring community connectedness among diverse sexual minority populations

Theory and research agree that connectedness to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community is an important construct to account for in understanding issues related to health and well-being among gay and bisexual men. However, the measurement of this construct among lesbian and bisexual women or racial and ethnic minority individuals has not yet been adequately investigated. This study examined the reliability and validity of an existing measure of connectedness to the LGBT Community among a diverse group of sexual minority individuals in New York City, and whether differences in connectedness existed across gender and race or ethnicity. Scores on the measure demonstrated both internal consistency and construct stability across subgroups defined by gender and race or ethnicity. The subgroups did not differ in their mean levels of connectedness, and scores on the measure demonstrated factorial, convergent, and discriminant validity, both generally and within each of the subgroups. Inconsistencies were observed with regard to which scores on the measure demonstrated predictive validity in their associations with indicators of mental health and well-being. The scale is a useful tool for researchers and practitioners interested in understanding the role of community connectedness in the lives of diverse populations of sexual minority individuals.     

Child sexual abuse: community concerns in urban Tanzania

The aim of this study was to explore community perceptions about child sexual abuse in Tanzania. Thirteen focus group discussions were conducted with adult community members. The core category, children's rights challenged by lack of agency, was supported by eight categories. Aware but distressed portrayed feelings of hopelessness, lack of trust in the healthcare and legal systems reflected perceived malpractice, decreased respect for children's rights referred to poor parental care and substance abuse, myths justifying CSA illustrated cultural beliefs to rationalize child sexual abuse, disclosure threatened by fear of stigma and discrimination aligned the manifestations that prevent disclosure, actions driven by economic circumstances described the economical dependence of victims, urging a change in procedures reflected informants' wish to ally with local governance and pressure groups, and willingness to act indicated the community's role in supporting victims. The study showed how lack of agency calls for efforts to increase children's human rights at all levels.     

Unwanted sexual activity among married women in urban China

This paper examines the prevalence, precursors, and consequences of unwanted marital sex activities in a national sample of 1,127 married urban Chinese women aged 20-64. During the lifetime of their current marriage, 32% reported ever experiencing unwanted spousal intercourse, with about one-fifth reporting that this unwanted intercourse ever involved force. Reports for the past year were 21% unwanted intercourse, 22% unwanted sex act(s), and 72% sex only to please the husband. The major risk factors for these activities were poor relationship quality (hitting, lack of daily intimacy and foreplay, and husband insensitivity to wife's sexual needs); a woman's negative attitudes towards sex, and weak bargaining position (low income share, husband's family of superior economic status, and no additional adults in home). In addition, unwanted activity was more common when women reported sexual dysfunctions (dryness, pain, low arousal, inorgasmia), were more educated, and had more permissive sex attitudes. Net of feedback effects, unwanted sexual activity diminished women's psychological well-being.     

A sexual assault primary prevention model with diverse urban youth

In this study, a nonprofit community mental health clinic developed a socioecological model of sexual abuse prevention that was implemented in a public school. The goal of the program was to promote and create community change within individuals and the school community by reducing tolerance of sexual violence and sexual harassment. Participants were 5th-12th graders at a school from a Midwest city. Completed measures were obtained from 202 students, and a quasiexperimental time series research design was developed to evaluate the effectiveness of the prevention program. The program was found to be effective at increasing participant's knowledge of sexual abuse, awareness of school and community sexual assault support resources, and identification of components of healthy and unhealthy relationships.     

'A man in the making': sexual masculinities within changing training cultures

The academic representation of social transformation in Britain has underplayed the key contribution of sexual politics. More specifically, sociological accounts of changing social relations within institutional sites has served to make invisible sexual identities. From research on a Modern Apprenticeship in the mid 1990's, empirical material is used to make visible male sexualities within Further Education. Importantly, we suggest that in order to capture the dynamics of the interplay between labour process restructuring and regendering, there is a need to refocus upon sexual cultures. In this local site, currently experiencing rapid institutional changes in training practices, a range of young male sexual cultures are identified. With reference to institutional spaces and micro-cultural relations, we illustrate how these sexual cultures construct themselves through sexual difference. Finally, we also consider the importance of sexual knowledges in young people's post-16 education and training.     

The sexual inhibition (SIS) and sexual excitation (SES) scales: I. Measuring sexual inhibition and excitation proneness in men

This study involves the development and initial validation of a questionnaire measuring the propensity for sexual inhibition and excitation in men: the Sexual Inhibition & Sexual Excitation Scales (SIS/SES). The underlying theoretical model postulates that sexual response and associated behavior depend on dual control mechanisms, involving excitatory and inhibitory neurophysiological systems. The scales and their discriminant and convergent validity and test‐retest reliability are described. In a sample of 408 sexually functional men (mean age = 22.8 years), factor analyses identified three higher‐level factors: two related to sexual inhibition and one to sexual excitation. Multigroup Confirmatory Factor Analyses revealed that the factor structure provided an acceptable fit to the data obtained in a second (N = 459; mean age = 20.9 years) and third (N = 313; mean age = 46.2 years) sample of men, with similar distributions and relationships with other measures. Theoretical issues and areas for further research, including male sexual dysfunction and risk taking, are discussed.     

Preventing child sexual abuse: parents' perceptions and practices in urban Nigeria

This study examined parents' perceptions of child sexual abuse as well as prevention practices in an urban community in southwest Nigeria. Questionnaires were collected from 387 parents and caregivers of children younger than 15 years of age. Results showed that many parents felt CSA was a common problem in the community, and most parents disagreed with common child sexual abuse myths. In addition, almost all parents ( >90%) reported communicating with their child(ren) about stranger danger. However, about 47% felt their children could not be abused, and over a quarter (27.1%) often left their children alone and unsupervised. There were no significant variations in the perceptions of child sexual abuse and communication practices. The implications of findings for child sexual abuse prevention are discussed.     

Clean and green organizing in urban neighborhoods: Measuring perceived and objective outcomes

ABSTRACT

One way in which urban community organizations attempt to improve neighborhood health is through cleaning and greening efforts. Few studies have evaluated how such efforts are related to changes in both residents’ perceptions of neighborhoods and objective community-wide cleaning and greening indicators over time. Drawing upon quantitative and qualitative data collected during an evaluation of a community-building initiative in two communities, results show how neighborhood changes in cleaning and greening were reflected in perceived and objective measures and how these measures compare across different time periods and sub-groups of residents within the two target communities. We provide suggestions for additional ways that future evaluations of urban cleaning and greening efforts can examine the impact.     

An examination of sexual strategies used by urban southern and rural Midwestern university women

The purposes of this study were (a) to determine whether women's use of persuasion, non‐physical coercion, and physical force strategies to obtain sex from a man varied between U.S. women from an urban Southern and rural Midwestern university and (b) to determine if sexual behavior history and early courtship behavior affected the use of these strategies (or not using any strategy). Women from the Midwest and the South did not differ in their use of sexual strategies. There were, however, other variables that accounted for differences in women's use of sexual strategies. Women who used persuasion strategies had fewer lifetime sexual partners than women who used any other strategy. Women who used physical force strategies reported a lower age at first intercourse and more early courtship behaviors than all others. Overall, the results indicated that sexual strategies are related to sexual behavior history and early courtship behaviors rather than cultural setting or demographics.     

Neighborhood structural inequality, collective efficacy, and sexual risk behavior among urban youth

We draw on collective efficacy theory to extend a contextual model of early adolescent sexual behavior. Specifically, we hypothesize that neighborhood structural disadvantage--as measured by levels of concentrated poverty, residential instability, and aspects of immigrant concentration--and diminished collective efficacy have consequences for the prevalence of early adolescent multiple sexual partnering. Findings from random effects multinomial logistic regression models of the number of sexual partners among a sample of youth, age 11 to 16, from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (N = 768) reveal evidence of neighborhood effects on adolescent higher-risk sexual activity. Collective efficacy is negatively associated with having two or more sexual partners versus one (but not zero versus one) sexual partner. The effect of collective efficacy is dependent upon age: The regulatory effect of collective efficacy increases for older adolescents.     

Slimness and self‐rated sexual attractiveness: Comparisons of men and women in two cultures

The relationship between body mass index (BMI) and self‐rated sexual attractiveness was studied on the basis of representative surveys of adult populations in Finland and in St. Petersburg in order to find out whether the body ideals related to sexuality differ in the two cultures. Data were analyzed by calculating correlations and by conducting regression analyses. In both countries, the connection between BMI and sexual attractiveness was stronger for women than men. St. Petersburg men were the only group in which thin people did not rate themselves as sexually more attractive than corpulent people. Regression analyses showed that (a) the impact of BMI on sexual attractiveness was not totally caused by the controlling variable age; (b) the hypothesized mediating variables, sexual activity and satisfaction, did not diminish the relationship between BMI and sexual attractiveness; and (c) the relationship was stronger in Finland than in St. Petersburg.     

Measuring and reporting campus sexual assault: Privilege and exclusion in what we know and what we do

As awareness of and national attention to campus sexual assault in the U.S. has grown, efforts to study and respond to the problem have increased. While these efforts are to be applauded, they have yet to fully challenge or correct the privileged and exclusive perspectives and assumptions regarding student experiences of campus sexual assault. Specifically, the experiences of white, heterosexual, cisgender, middle‐class, and American citizens who are students at primarily elite, traditional colleges and universities are taken as the norm, while experiences of students of color, LGBTQ students, and international students are neglected. Here we examine two primary sources of information regarding campus sexual assault: large‐scale self‐report surveys and individual reporting to authorities. We first review the content of select large‐scale surveys used to gather and measure self‐reported data from students on the scope, prevalence, and character of campus sexual assault, and identify areas of omission and neglect regarding marginalized students. We then review literature on barriers to reporting to authorities specific to these groups that further exclude them from our understanding of the problem. We end with recommendations for improved efforts to study and respond to campus sexual assault that are more inclusive and comprehensive.     

From nightlife conventions to daytime hidden agendas: dynamics of urban sexual territories in the South of France

This article focuses on the space-time dynamics of sexual encounters in city neighborhoods associated with sex work and cruising. The data were collected as part of a multisite, longitudinal ethnographic study conducted in major cities of southern France. The results suggest that there is a continuous interaction between these sexualized public spaces and urban planning. Urban planners, however, are not the only actors shaping the location and the use of the space. Participants create a dialectical movement from night normative worlds to occult practices interwoven with daytime activities. They also create subtle social rules governing actors and their practices.     

Acknowledgement and support matter: A brief report on gender identity and sexual orientation at a large,urban university

ABSTRACT

Objective. To examine reporting trends of students identifying as LGBTQIA+ following changes made to the ACHA-NCHA-II survey about gender identity and sexual orientation.

Methods. Data were analyzed from two sources for the purpose of triangulation: the ACHA-NCHA-II 2016 survey specific to our university and an electronic audience response survey.

Participants. Primary analyses included first-year students from the ACHA-NCHA-II data (N = 158; spring 2016) and the audience response survey (N = 1,452; August 2016).

Results. Five percent of students did not identify as cis-gender and 21% did not identify as straight/heterosexual. The sexual orientation trend was confirmed by the audience response survey.

Conclusions. The percentage of students identifying as LGBTQIA+ increased nationally between the ACHA-NCHA-II 2014 and 2016 survey samples, a trend which was confirmed using an independent audience response survey. This information has implications for university programming and inclusivity efforts nationwide.     

Archiving cultures

This paper argues that to understand the legitimacy of a culture we need to investigate its relation to the archive, the site for the accumulation of records. Archive reason is a kind of reason which is concerned with detail, it constantly directs us away from the big generalization, down into the particularity and singularity of the event. Increasingly the focus has shifted from archiving the lives of the good and the great down to the detail of mundane everyday life. One implication here is that rather than see the archive as a specific place in which we deposit records, documents, photographs, film, video and all the minutiae on which culture is inscribed, should we not seek to extend the walls of the archive to place it around the everyday, the world? If everything can potentially be of significance shouldn't part of the archive fever be to record and document everything, as it could one day be useful? The problem then becomes, not what to put into the archive, but what one dare leave out. Some of the implications of these questions were considered by Georg Simmel, in his argument that there has been a build up and overload in the production and circulation of objective culture. This is now beyond our subjective capacity to assimilate and order, given the finite limits of the human life course we all face. It is something which confronts the individual with irresolvable dilemmas over selectivity, with each particular choice amounting to a wager which inevitably closes off others. Related questions about the difficulties of handling cultural completeness, were also addressed by Jorge Luis Borges in his discussion of the Library of Babel and the Aleph. Yet both could hardly have anticipated the full implications of the electronic archive: the development of new technologies for storing, searching and communicating information through the Internet with its databases and hypertext links. The electronic archive offers new possibilities for speed, mobility and completeness of access to cultures which have become digitalized, which raise fundamental questions about ownership, intellectual property rights, censorship and democratic access. The implications for culture are clear: the new electronic archives will not only change the form in which culture is produced and recorded, but the wider conditions under which it is enacted and lived as well.     

Curious erasures: the sexual in wartime sexual violence

Wartime sexual violence is especially egregious precisely because it is a sexual form of violence that causes particular harms. Yet, curiously, and in contrast to feminist theory on sexual violence more generally, the sexual has been erased from frames of understanding in dominant accounts of wartime rape. This article places the seeming certainty that “wartime rape is not about sex (it’s about power/violence)” under critical scrutiny and poses questions about the stakes of the erasure of the sexual in explanations of conflict-related sexual violence. It argues that the particular urgency that accompanies this erasure reflects the workings of familiar distinctions between war and peace, as well as efforts to clearly recognize violence and separate it from sex. Erasing the sexual from accounts of wartime rape thus ultimately reinscribes the normal and the exceptional as separate, and reproduces a reductive notion of heterosexual masculine sex (in peacetime) that is ontologically different from the violence of war.