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PubMed1986

Sexual scripts: permanence and change.

A general introduction to scripting theory is offered, attempting to provide links between macrolevel considerations of sociocultural development and general theories of individual development. The scripting of behavior is examined on three distinct levels: cultural scenarios (instruction in collective meanings), interpersonal scripts (the application of specific cultural scenarios by a specific individual in a specific social context), and intrapsychic scripts (the management of desires as experienced by the individual). These concepts of the scripting of behavior are then applied to sexual behavior. Interpersonal scripts are seen as the ordering of representations of self and other that facilitate the occurrence of a sexual act; intrapsychic scripts represent the ordering of images and desires that elicit and sustain sexual arousal. Issues of stability and change in sexual scripts are then examined in terms of the changing circumstances and requirements associated with movement through the life cycle.

Age Factors↗
PubMed1993

The prevalence of gender-atypical behavior in elementary school children.

OBJECTIVE: To supplement the few small-scale studies on convenience samples of boys with an epidemiological study on the prevalence of gender-atypical behaviors (GABs) in boys and girls and to assess the influence of variation of age, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. METHOD: The present study, a postal questionnaire survey, used an existing pool of GAB items for boys, developed comparable GAB items for girls, and analyzed parent-reported frequencies of GABs in a demographically heterogeneous community sample of 687 boys and girls age 6 to 10 years. RESULTS: The majority of GABs were quite rare, but there was considerable variability in their prevalence. Nevertheless, many children show multiple GABs although each individual GAB at low frequency; for instance, 10 or more different GABs were exhibited by 22.8% of boys and 38.6% of girls. Only few GABs varied significantly with age, ethnicity, or socioeconomic status. CONCLUSIONS: These data are of relevance to clinicians counseling parents who are worried about the occurrence of GABs in their children.

Child↗
PubMed1986

The revival of "Dora": advances in psychoanalytic theory and technique.

For nearly six decades after its publication in 1905, Freud's remarkable case of Dora remained untouched by critical comment. However, beginning in the early 1970's, an abundance of articles began to appear, which focused exclusively on the Dora case. The present paper reviews the literature of this so-called "Dora revival" in order to explain the historical and theoretical reasons leading to this extraordinary burst of research. Above all, two vital developments in the psychoanalytic discipline created the climate that fostered the Dora revival. First, there was a revolutionary change in attitude toward the phenomenon of countertransference: in contrast to the classical view of countertransference as a disruptive interference in treatment, analysts increasingly regarded countertransference as a pervasive and natural process, which could be potentially utilized to enhance understanding of the patient's unconscious conflicts and defenses. Second, there was enormous and rapid growth of a comprehensive psychoanalytic theory of adolescence and its treatment. Thus, based on a more favorable attitude toward countertransference, and a much improved understanding of the unique problems of adolescence, psychoanalysts could reexamine and better understand the decisive events that contributed to Freud's abortive analytic treatment of Dora.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1983

Children's perceptions of sex differences in babies and adolescents: a cross-national study.

A sample of 838 children aged 5-15 in Australia, England, North America, and Sweden were interviewed about physical and sexual development. One section covered how children perceived sex differences. Criteria used for scoring were based on a biological realism scale. In identifying sex differences of newborn babies, a progression from realistic to unrealistic recognition was observed with increasing age in all countries. The Swedish younger age groups were more realistic than their English-speaking peers, with the latter catching up in the teenage years. In discerning pubertal sex differences, children tended to move from presexual ideas between 9 and 11 years and to have achieved full sexual answers between 13 and 15 years. Evidence did not support the latency period theory or the presence of castration fantasies in children. Cross-national differences are discussed and their implications explored.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1990

Essay on the diagnosis and nature of paraphilia.

Increasing clinical experience has allowed the formulation of three psychodynamic viewpoints about the nature of the paraphilic disorder. Paraphilia is a disorder of sexual identity development, often solely of the intention component, that has three characteristics: a long-standing, highly arousing, unusual erotic preoccupation; a pressure to act upon the erotic fantasy; sexual dysfunction with a partner during conventional sexual behavior. Paraphilia is also a disorder of self-regulation characterized by a considerable gap between personal aspirations and behaviors. Finally, paraphilia is a dramatic impairment in the capacity to love. Two rarely recognized issues complicate the nosology of paraphilia: Many related sexual problems are often confused with paraphilia, and some paraphilias manifest themselves as variations in gender identity and object choice. The defensive functions of paraphilia are discussed and common terms used in conjunction with paraphilia are redefined.

Adult↗
PubMed1981

Sexual development, age, and dating: a comparison of biological and social influences upon one set of behaviors.

Data from the U.S. National Health Examination Survey of 12-17-year-old youths were used to determine whether the development of the social behavior of dating is more closely linked to the level of sexual maturation or to the progression through age grades without reference to sexual maturation. Regression analyses and partial correlations show that individuals levels of sexual maturation add very little to the explained variance in dating after age had been taken into account. It appears that social pressures, based on behavior considered typical and appropriate at various ages, determines the onset of dating in adolescents. Individual rates of sexual maturation that deviate from the norm for that age have little impact on dating. These findings show how social standards can reduce dramatically the impact of individual biological processes on institutionalized forms of behavior.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1994

The invisible woman.

This paper explores the meaning of experiences of invisibility in women. It was inspired in the course of psychotherapy with a woman who felt invisible in her feminine identity and who hid her feminine desire within an imaginary paper bag. Her visual imagery traces a pattern of pathological feminine development through a faulty sensory connection between her body, the external world, and her unconscious symbolic self-representation. Questions about her invisibility have evoked an exploration of two developmental models of visual thinking--a cognitive and a psychoanalytic model. A study of the myth of Persephone contributes a literary prototype for the understanding of the transmission of invisibility across the generations of mothers and daughters. Furthermore, the analysis of several literary passages from the work of Angela Carter serves the purpose of drawing the reader into the experiential world of femininity as it moves from the invisible to the visible. The paper blends together ideas from various, often contending, theorists in a way which highlights how theories can complement one another in explaining clinical phenomena.

Adult↗
PubMed1990

Sexual confusion among certain college males.

In dealing with college age (18-22) males, clinical observations have shown a fairly common inability to successfully form intimate relationships with same-age females. This problem often appears to be due to an inability to bond and trust that is rooted in the formative years in the nuclear home. When this happens, the young male frequently develops a fear of being sexually abnormal, perhaps even homosexual. This manifests itself in shame, anxiety, depression, denial, reaction formation, performance anxiety, concern about being found out, isolation, substance abuse and, occasionally, acting out. Getting such persons to admit these fears is generally extremely difficult, requiring gentle and empathetic, but persistent, probing on the part of the therapist. Therapy consists of understanding and acceptance by the client that these fears are most often reactive, that they are commonly held, and that when they are seen in proper perspective, they often diminish. The present paper reviews some of the literature on sexual developmental issues of the adolescent male as a backdrop for this problem. The specific difficulties related to reactive homophobia are explored, and some therapeutic approaches suggested.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1989

Adolescent girls' representations of their genital inner space.

Psychoanalytical theory and research based on Freud's observations have viewed female sexual development mainly in terms of the fantasies and sensations aroused by the external genitals of the child. Other authors refer to the significance of females' inner sexual organs that define the cavity surrounded by body mass, included in the body image. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between girls' representative modalities of their genital inner space and their identity formation. Randomly selected adolescent girls (n = 275) aged 11 to 18 years were asked to make a drawing (1) of the inside of their body and (2) of their sexual organs. Analysis of the main qualitative features of the drawings indicates that structuration and integration of genital inner space in the body image is a slow developmental process.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1996

The status of psychic reality in adolescence. An adult female patient's quasi-adolescent material and the analyst's counter transference response.

The author holds that the crisis of adolescence is in fact one of psychic reality, its elements being loss of boundaries, externalisation and the involvement of a third party. In this view, it is essential to conceive of adolescence differently from adulthood, in that, for example, an adolescent's acting out may not be solely a matter of regression but to a considerable extent a consequence of his or her physical development. It is noted that the boundaries between psychic and material reality are fluid throughout life and that adolescents crave identificatory models. The author stresses the importance of the psychic reality of the other in the adolescent's crisis. After considering various views, including those of Freud, on psychic reality and the crises of adolescence, he illustrates his thesis by the clinical example of two adolescent episodes of perversion forming part of an adult female patient's material. In the author's view, these instances of acting out had helped the patient to regain her auto-erotic capacity in the pleasure of fantasy life. He considers that a mutative interpretation must touch upon the primal fantasy and therefore involve the entire person of the analyst in the transference.

Acting Out↗
PubMed1991

Penis envy: libidinal metaphor and experiential metonym.

The subjective narrative employed by the little girl to account for her femininity draws on her primary sense of femaleness, as well as on any secondary elaborations. The secondary nature of femininity is highlighted by the Freudian view wherein femininity is thought to be achieved through changes in libidinal aims and objects. The primary nature of femininity is highlighted by current views elaborating on ego development. An examination of the subjective role of the phallus in a number of clinical reports reveals that envy of the penis may represent the intersection of several associative chains. For example, the girl's castration reaction could result from a condensation of the libidinal theme of not having a penis as Freud argued. However, Freud's reliance on the phallus as a metaphoric representation of instinctual vicissitudes is not an end point. In addition to Freud's elaborations of the phallic theme, the desire to possess the penis may represent the girl's associations to contiguous events. That is, through the process of displacement, the phallus also functions as a metonymic symbol. To fully appreciate penis envy, both the metaphoric and metonymic meanings assigned to femininity must be analysed.

Body Image↗
PubMed1976

Freud's views on early female sexuality in the light of direct child observation.

Freud's writings on early female sexuality are reviewed in order to demonstrate which of his central assumptions are supported and which have been corrected by the direct observation of young children. The study of the emergence of core gender identity in little girls is a key to the modification of Freud's statements on the onset of and crucial factors in the development of femininity. Cognitive functions, learning experiences, and language are believed to be more important than Freud stressed, and penis envy and feelings of inferiority are relegated to a less universal and less necessary place in the onset of femininity. The role of the father is given different emphasis. Direct observation clarifies many aspects of masturbation or early genital self-stimulation in the young female: its onset; its feminine rather than masculine character; its early vicissitudes; its importance relative to other behavior; the impact of the discovery of anatomical difference; one special way it is affected by parental attitude; and how it contrasts with comparable behavior in the young male. Observation refutes Freud's often quoted statement that masturbation is further removed from the nature of women than of men.

Child↗
PubMed1996

Female sexuality and historical time: a comparison of sexual biographies of German women born between 1895 and 1936.

Ninety-one German women ages 50 to 91 years (birth cohorts: 1895 to 1936) were interviewed in-depth about their sexual development through the life span. This article presents the results on the historical change in female sexuality during childhood, puberty, and young marriage. The sample was divided into four subgroups, according to the year of birth, which were compared to each other. In contrast to the older groups, a higher percentage of women in the younger cohorts had experience in childhood sexual play, masturbation, "real" and faked orgasm, with historical time only having a slight influence on marital sexuality and fertility experiences. Data indicate that subjects born later were not only more experienced sexually but changed intraindividually more often in sexual matters, whereas the older women mostly "conserved" the sexual morals and habits learned in youth. Subjective sexual experience of the interviewees is illustrated by quotations.

Aged↗
PubMed1991

[Attachment and sexuality in psychoanalytic theories and practice].

Based on Parin's statement that sexuality has disappeared in psychoanalysis both in theory and practice, the classical libido theory is compared to empirical observations made in infants and here especially the theories of Bowlby. Both the concept of sexual climax in early childhood and the concept of sexual drives as a fundamental motivation for the psychic development are not on agreement with empirical studies carried out in infants and the findings of psychobiology and ethology. Bowlby describes the relationship between infant and mother as a bipersonal binding which begins during the first months of life. The child does not strive for sexual stimulation of erogenous zones but rather for tactile, acoustic and visual responses as well as physical contact and tranquility related to one known and trustworthy person. This binding is totally different to the sexual relationship which evolves during adolescence and in which binding takes place between persons of the same species but to whom no relation had existed during early and later childhood. It is important for the psychotherapist that he be able to distinguish between being an object of the childish wish for binding or of adult sexual desires.

Adult↗
PubMed1979

Some observations and hypotheses about the psychoanalytic theory of adult development.

The developmental framework, when applied to adulthood, emphasizes the continuing evolution of the personality at five or fifty and 'focuses on the formation of psychic structure in process and underscores the continuity of normal and pathologic outcomes.' (COPER 9, 1974, p. 14). Many of the events we have discussed here are experiences unique to the adult and outside the realm of the child. Their uniqueness and developmental significance need to be better accounted for in psychoanalytic theory. Confrontation with each adult developmental task or crisis produces basic change in the life of each individual. To quote Bibring (1959): 'We find them as developmental phenomena at points of no return between one phase and the next when decisive changes deprive former central needs and modes of living of their significance forcing the acceptance of highly charged new goals and functions.' (p. 119). One purpose of this paper has been to demonstrate that such developmental turning points of no return are not limited to childhood but occur throughout the life cycle.

Adult↗
PubMed1975

Heterosexual interest in homosexual males.

Androphilic, ephebophilic, and homosexual pedophilic males were compared on heterosexual interest and arousal potential. The former was measured by the subjects' retrospective reports and the latter by penile responses to pictures of females. The penile responses of the ephebophilic and homosexual pedophilic groups to pictures of physically mature females were not different from those of androphilic males. In the present study as well as in an earlier one, the ephebophilic males responded significantly more to physically mature males than to physically mature females. Homosexual pedophilic males showed little difference in responses to physically mature males and females. In retrospective reports of heterosexual interest and experience and of development of homosexual interest and activities, there were only two differences among the groups: as opposed to androphilic males, a relatively greater number of ephebophilic and homosexual pedophilic males indicated that up to age 15 or later they had felt attracted exclusively to females and that they had been seduced in childhood or early adolescence by a male. These results will have to be replicated before being accepted as reliable. As in some earlier studies, there was a weak but significant correlation of degree of "feminine gender identity" with age at onset of homosexual interest and with heterosexual interest or experience. A higher degree of feminine gender identity went together with less heterosexual interest and experience and with an earlier onset of homosexual interest and experience.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2000

Sexual identity trajectories among sexual-minority youths: gender comparisons.

The present investigation explored gender differences in sexual identity development--first same-sex attractions, self-labeling, same-sex sexual contact, and disclosure--among 164 sexual-minority young adults. Based on interviews, results indicated the value of assessing gender differences in the context, timing, spacing, and sequencing of sexual identity milestones. Adolescent males had an earlier onset of all milestones except disclosure. The context for sexual identity milestones were likely to be emotionally oriented for young women and sexually oriented for young men. The gap from first same-sex attractions (8-9 years of age) to first disclosure (around 18 years) averaged 10 years for both sexes. Young women followed label-first developmental trajectories; men were more likely to pursue sex before identifying themselves as gay. In terms of achieving sexual identity milestones, gender mattered, but it was not everything.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1995

Sexually abused and nonabused mothers' discussions about sex and their children's sexual knowledge.

This study investigated the impact of a mother's experience of childhood sexual abuse on her discussion of sex with her child. Two groups of sexually abused and nonabused mothers, drawn from a larger community sample and matched for social class and the sex and age of their index children, were asked about discussion of sexual information within their family. Children were interviewed about their sexual knowledge. Significantly more mothers who reported an incident of sexual abuse during their childhood said that they had detailed discussions with their child about sexual development and contraception than mothers who reported no childhood incidence of abuse. Although there was no difference between the two groups in independent interviewers' ratings of the children's overall sexual knowledge, more children from the abused mothers' group mentioned their parents as a definite source of sexual information, in particular, regarding contraception. There were also differences between the two groups in the children's responses to a set of ambiguous pictures. More children in the abused mothers' group than the nonabused group gave stories related to child abductions and the possibility of sexual abuse in response to two of the pictures. A mothers' willingness to acknowledge childhood sexual abuse is related to more open discussion of sexual information within the family.

Adolescent↗