Nudity as a Disinhibiting Cue in a Date Rape Analogue

A Test of Three Different Explanations for Low Stimulus Response Discrimination in Phallometric Testing

Phallometric assessment is used to assess men's sexual interest in children and to assist in risk assessment and treatment planning. A common response pattern, especially when the assessment is conducted in a forensic context, is an indiscriminate pattern of penile responses: No sexual stimulus seems to produce a substantially higher response than another. This indiscriminate response profile could be the result of (1) faking good (in particular, reducing the responses to child stimuli); (2) floor or ceiling effects caused by low or high arousability, or (3) non-exclusivity (the individual is similarly sexually interested in both children and adults). In this study of 2,858 adult male patients who underwent volumetric phallometric assessment for sexual interest in children between 1995 and 2011, we tested these three possible explanations. Results showed support for each of the explanations, but the variance accounted for in response discrimination was quite small when considering each explanation (separately or when considered together). We discuss avenues for future research to better discern the causes of indiscriminate responding in phallometric assessment.

Effect of a Condom Cover on Vaginal Photoplethysmographic Responses

INTRODUCTION

The vaginal photoplethysmograph (VPP) is a reusable intravaginal device often employed in sexual psychophysiology studies to assess changes in vaginal blood flow, an indicator of sexual arousal.

AIM

To test whether placing a disposable cover on the VPP probe impacts the acquired data. A condom cover would reduce risk of disease transmission and likely increase participant comfort but may negatively impact the VPP signal.

METHOD

The genital responses of 25 cisgender women (mean age = 21.3 years, standard deviation = 2.6) were assessed with VPP in a within-subjects design with 2 conditions-with and without a polyisoprene condom cover. Sexual responses were elicited by audiovisual film clips that varied in erotic intensity: nonsexual (nonsexual male-female interaction), low-intensity sexual (nude exercise), and high-intensity sexual (male-female intercourse). Women continuously rated their sexual arousal during stimulus presentations.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE

Change in vaginal pulse amplitude and also self-reported sexual arousal.

RESULTS

The magnitude of sexual response to each stimulus category and the overall pattern of results were found to be highly similar in the cover-off and cover-on conditions. The high-intensity sexual stimulus category elicited a greater sexual response than all other categories. The low-intensity sexual category elicited a (small) genital response in only the cover-on condition, although we suspect this is a spurious finding. There was no difference in the average number of edited movement artifacts across conditions.

CLINICAL IMPLICATIONS

Potential benefits of encasing the VPP probe with a protective cover include enhanced participant safety and comfort, especially if assessing genital responses of high-risk or immunocompromised samples. The use of a cover complies with current guidelines for reprocessing semi-critical medical devices (eg, vaginal ultrasound probes) in many regions.

STRENGTHS & LIMITATIONS

Although the idea of a VPP probe cover had been discussed among sexual psychophysiology researchers, this is the first study to empirically test whether a cover could jeopardize VPP data. Potential limitations include the use of a 10-Hz VPP sampling rate and a cover that was not tailored to the size of the VPP probe.

CONCLUSION

Placing a protective cover on the VPP probe did not appear to meaningfully impact sexual arousal or the VPP data. Based on these results and the potential advantages of a protective cover, researchers may wish to integrate the use a condom cover in their experiment protocols and clinical applications. Sawatsky ML, Lalumière ML. Effect of a Condom Cover on Vaginal Photoplethysmographic Responses. J Sex Med 2020; 17:702-715.

Genital Responses to Rape Vignettes Among Young Men: The Influence of Mood and Directed Attention

Although it is clear that men with a history of sexual assaults against women produce higher relative genital responses to rape vignettes in the laboratory than do men without such a history, it remains unclear what aspects of the vignettes are eliciting these responses, and whether the genital responses are affected by situational factors. The antisocial tendencies hypothesis states that many men are inhibited by cues of violence, suffering, and coercion in rape vignettes, but other men, particularly antisocial and sexually aggressive men, are not so inhibited. In this study, we investigated whether the hypothesized inhibition to rape vignettes among nonoffenders could be affected by manipulation of mood and directed attention. A total of 48 young men were exposed to audio-recorded vignettes describing mutually consenting and nonviolent sexual interactions, mutually consenting and violent sexual interactions, nonconsenting and violent sexual interactions, and nonsexual and nonviolent social interactions (within-subjects). Participants were randomly assigned to a mood manipulation designed to induce a happy, neutral, or sad mood (between-subjects). All were asked to pay attention to either sex words or violent words while listening to the vignettes (within-subjects). As is typically observed, genital responses were lower (inhibited) when vignettes included cues of violence or nonconsent. Both happy and sad mood inductions reduced this inhibition, so that men induced into a happy or sad mood showed greater relative responding to cues of violence or nonconsent compared with men in a neutral mood. The attention manipulation had no significant effect. Results suggest that genital responses to rape cues can be situationally influenced, but not necessarily as predicted by the antisocial tendencies hypothesis.

The impact of sexual arousal on elements of sexual decision making: Sexual self-restraint, motivational state, and self-control

Sexual arousal has been shown to have an impact on risk-taking and intentions to engage in risky sexual behaviour (e.g., Ariely & Loewenstein, 2006; Shuper & Fisher, 2008; Skakoon-Sparling, Cramer, & Shuper, 2016); however, the mechanisms underlying this effect are not well understood. To further investigate the effects of sexual arousal on sexual health decision-making, the current study was designed to examine the associations among self-control, sexual self-restraint, and motivational state, as well as the impact of sexual arousal on these factors. Forty-nine female and 26 male participants viewed either sexually arousing (experimental condition) or control video clips and responded to inventories designed to measure their self-control, sexual self-restraint, and meta-motivational state balance (within the Rules domain of Reversal Theory). A moderate positive correlation was found across all participants between self-control and self-restraint. Participants in the sexual arousal condition scored significantly lower on measures of self-control and sexual self-restraint; no effect was found for the meta-motivational state measure used. The results of this study suggest that sexual arousal either functions to deplete individuals' internal reserves of self-control or that it creates conditions that make it difficult to access the cognitive capacity to engage in self-control. This effect, combined with the correspondingly low score on our measure of sexual self-restraint, suggest that this may be an avenue through which sexual arousal negatively impacts sexual health decision-making.