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Psychosexual Development in young
Adulthood
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In Middle Adulthood
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In Late Adulthood
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Sexual Behavior
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Sexual Enhancement
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Sexual Relations
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Problems and Dysfunction
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Birth Control
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STDs and Responsibility

• Being sexual is an essential part of being human.
• Paradoxically, sexuality is a source of great pleasure and profound satisfaction, yet it also can be a source of guilt, confusion, infection, and exploitation.

• Sources of sexual learning include parents, peers, the media, and partners.
• 1. Parental influence-children learn a great deal about sexuality by observing their parents' behavior.
• Most parents are ambivalent about their children's developing sexual nature.
• Although parental norms and beliefs are generally influential, they do not appear to have a strong effect on an adolescent's decision to become sexually active: Peers appear more important.

• 2. Peer influence-adolescents are frequently misinformed about sexuality by their peers.
• 3. Media influence-the media and contemporary
American popular culture have a profound impact on sexual attitudes.
• 4. Partner influence-as we move into young adulthood, sexual partners replace: parents, peers, and the media as sources of sexual learning.

• Developmental tasks in young adulthood include the following:
• 1. integrating love and sex,
• 2. forging intimacy and commitment,
• 3. making fertility/childbearing decisions,
• 4. establishing a sexual orientation, and
• 5. developing a sexual philosophy.
• A sexual script is a set of expectations of how one is to behave sexually as a female or male and as heterosexual, lesbian, or gay; the scripts we are given for sexual behavior tend to be traditional.

• 1. Female sexual scripts traditionally focus on feelings more than sex. Female sexual scripts include the following ideas:
• a. Sex is both bad and good.
• b. Don't touch me "down there".
• c. Sex is for men.
• d. Men should know what women want.
• e. Women shouldn't talk about sex.
• f. Women should look like models.
• g. Women are nurturers.
• h. There is only one right way to experience orgasm.

• 2. Male sexual scripts traditionally view sex as performance, and incorporate a separation of sex from love and attachment. Male sexual scripts include:
• a. Men should not have feelings.
• b. Performance is what counts.
• c. The man is in charge.
• d. A man always wants sex and is ready for it.
• e. All physical contact leads to sex.
• f. Sex equals intercourse.
• g. Sexual intercourse always leads to orgasm.

• 3. Contemporary sexual scripts have an increased recognition of female sexuality, and tend to be more relationship-centered rather than malecentered. Contemporary sexual scripts include the following:
• a. Sexual expression is positive.
• b. Sexual activities are a mutual exchange of erotic pleasure.
• c. Partners are equally involved and responsible.
• d. Masturbation and oral sex are legitimate sexual activities.
• e. Sexual activities can be initiated by either partner.

• f. Both partners have a right to experience orgasm.
• g. Non-marital sex is acceptable within the context of a relationship.
• h. Gay, lesbian, and bisexual orientations are more open and tolerated.

• 1. The term heterosexual refers to people who are sexually attracted to members of the other gender; homosexual refers to people who are attracted to members of the same gender; and bisexual refers to those who are attracted to both genders.
• 2. The term gay male, referring to men, and lesbian, in reference to women, replaces the term homosexual, which conveys negative connotations.

• 3. Sexual orientation, that is, a person's sexual identity as heterosexual, gay, lesbian, or bisexual, is a complex interaction of numerous social and personal factors.
• 4. Identifying oneself as gay or lesbian takes time and includes several stages:
• Homoeroticism, which is the erotic attraction to members of the same gender-generally precedes gay or lesbian activities by several years.

• 5. The stages in acquiring a lesbian or gay identity usually begin in late childhood or early adolescence.
These stages are:
• a. a fear or suspicion that one's desires are somehow different from others,
• b. labeling feelings of love, attraction, desire as homoerotic, and
• c. self-definition as lesbian or gay,
• d. additionally, for some gay men and lesbians, entering the gay subculture and incorporating a way of being in which sexual orientation is a large part of the identity of a person,
• e. and finally, having the first lesbian or gay love affair, and then,
• f. coming out by publicly acknowledging one's gayness.

• 6. Anti-gay prejudice is a strong dislike, fear, or hatred of lesbian and gay
• men.
• a. Homophobia is an irrational or phobic fear of gay men or lesbians.
• b. Anti-gay prejudice is derived from a deeply rooted insecurity, a strong fundamentalist religious orientation, and ignorance.
• 7. Bisexuality requires a rejection of both heterosexual and homosexual identities, and develops in multiple stages.

• Developmental tasks in middle adulthood include:
• 1. redefining sex in marital and other long-term relationships,
• 2. reevaluating one's sexuality, and
• 3. accepting the biological aging process.

• 1. As men age, they fear the loss of their sexual capacity but not their attractiveness.
• 2. As women age, they fear the loss of their attractiveness but not their sexuality.
• 3. Women reach their peak of sexual responsiveness in the late thirties or early forties; it is usually maintained at about the same level into the sixties and beyond.
• 4. Men reach their peak of sexual responsiveness in late adolescence or early adulthood; however, changes in sexual responsiveness do not become apparent until men are in their forties and fifties.

• Developmental tasks in later adulthood include changing sexuality and loss of partner.
• The sexuality of older Americans tends to be invisible.
• 1. Declines in sexuality among aging men and women is more cultural than biological.
• 2. In American culture, sexuality and romance are more likely to be associated with the young.
• 3. Sexuality is frequently linked to childbearing.
• 4. Older men are physiologically less responsive than they used to be, leading to greater difficulty in attaining or maintaining an erection.

• 5. Women are confronted with greater social constraints including an unfavorable gender ratio, greater likelihood of widowhood, norms against marrying younger men, and a double standard of aging.
• 6. Health and the availability of a partner are the primary determinants of an individual's sexual activity.

• Autoeroticism includes sexual activities that involve only the self-these activities include:
• 1. sexual fantasies, which are the most universal of all sexual behaviors and serve numerous psychic functions,
• 2. erotic dreams, which are overtly sexual dreams and are experienced by most men and many women, and
• 3. masturbation, which is the manual stimulation of one's own genitals.
• a. Masturbation is an important means of learning about our bodies.
• b. Whites have more liberal attitudes about masturbation than African-Americans and Latinos.

• Interpersonal sexuality includes a variety of sexual activities:
• 1. Touching-pleasuring is nongenital touching and caressing permitting each partner to discover what the other likes or dislikes.
• 2. Kissing is probably the most acceptable of all premarital sexual activities: It is associated with affection and attraction as well as jealousy.
• 3. Oral-genital sex-cunnilingus is the erotic stimulation of a woman's vulva by her partner's mouth and tongue; fellatio is the oral stimulation of a man's penis by his partner's sucking and licking.

• 4. Sexual intercourse or coitus is the insertion of the penis into the vagina and subsequent stimulation-it is associated with a complex set of interactions, meanings, and motivations.
• 5. Anal eroticism relates to sexual activities involving the anus-anal intercourse is the male's insertion of his erect penis into his partner's anus.

• Sexual enhancement is improving the quality of a sexual relationship, especially by pro- viding accurate information about sexuality, developing communication skills, fostering positive attitudes, and increasing self-awareness.
• A. Enhancing our sexual relationships requires:
• 1. accurate information about sexuality.
• 2. an orientation toward sex based on a pleasure rather than on a performance,
• 3. being in a relationship which allows a person's sexuality to flourish,

• 4. an ability to communicate verbally and nonverbally about sex,
• 5. being equally assertive and sensitive about sexual needs, and
• 6. accepting, understanding, and appreciating differences between partners.

• Each person has unique conditions for good sex.
These may include, but are not limited to:
• 1. feeling intimate with your partner,
• 2. feeling sexually capable,
• 3. feeling trust,
• 4. feeling aroused,
• 5. feeling physically and mentally alert, and
• 6. feeling positive about the environment and situation.

• Sexual arousal is the physiological responses, fantasies, and desires associated with sexual anticipation and sexual activity.
• 1. We have different levels of arousal, which are not necessarily associated with particular types of sexual activities.
• 2. Intensifying erotic pleasure focuses on intensifying arousal by having one's conditions for good sex met and focusing on the sensations one is experiencing.

• Nonmarital sexuality
• 1. Nonmarital sex is sexual activity, especially sexual intercourse that takes place outside marriage.
• 2. Premarital sex, as defined in the text, refers to younger, never-married adults under the age of 30.
• 3. Over the last several decades, premarital and nonmarital sex has gained increased acceptance.
• 4. Extramarital sex is sexual interaction that takes place outside the marital relationship: These interactions continue to receive consistent disapproval.

• 5. The decision to engage in premarital sex is influenced by individual, relationship, and environmental factors.
• 6. In new relationships, when sexual activities are being initiated, communication tends to be indirect and ambiguous: Traditionally, the male will initiate sexual intimacy.
• 7. When beginning a sexual involvement, we need to practice safe sex and discuss birth control:
Responsibility for contraception and safe sex generally requires verbal communication.
• 8. In comparison to marital relationships, men and women in cohabiting relationships, have

• Gay men, because of their socialization as males, are likely to initiate sexual activity earlier in the relationship than are lesbians.
• 1. In both gay and lesbian relationships, the more emotionally expressive partner is likely to initiate sexual interaction.
• 2. Sexual exclusivity is negotiable in gay and lesbian cultures.
• As a culture, we feel ambivalent about marital sex.
• 1. Sexual intercourse tends to diminish in frequency the longer a couple is married; however, most couples do not find this to be a problem if their overall relationship is good.

• 2. Sex within marriage differs from nonmarital sex in three ways:
• a. the expectation of monogamy,
• b. the socially sanctioned setting for reproduction, and
• c. the context for sex in a day-to-day world-that is, sexual intercourse must be arranged around working and child care schedules.

• Extramarital relationships violate our culture's fundamental assumption that marriages are monogamous.
• 1. Personal characteristics and quality of marriage appear to be the most important factors associated with extramarital relationships.

• Sexual dysfunctions are persistent sexual problems that cause distress to the indi- vidual or the partner-some dysfunctions are physical in origin; most, however, are psychological.
• 1. Common dysfunctions for women include the inability to attain orgasm, arousal difficulties and dyspareunia (painful intercourse).
• 2. Among men, the most common dysfunctions are the inability to achieve or maintain an erection, premature ejaculation, and delayed orgasm.

• Origins of sexual problems can be physical or psychological.
• 1. Sexual dysfunction may be physical or hormonal and may be related to various illnesses, medications, and alcohol or alcoholism.
• 2. The most dominant psychological causes of sexual dysfunction are performance anxiety and conflicts within the self.

• Contraception is the prevention of pregnancy using any number of devices, techniques, or drugs.
• 1. Over a year's time, a woman in a sexual relationship in which contraception is not used has an 85 to 90 percent chance of becoming pregnant.
• 2. Consistent use is the key to contraceptive effectiveness: The most consistent users of contraception explicitly communicate about it.

• Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy.
• The constitutional right to abortion was established by the Roe V. Wade decision in 1973.
• 2. The characteristics of women having abortions are summarized as follows:
• 3. Women tend to have multiple reasons for having abortions.
• a. Abortion is not taken lightly: The decision is complex.
• b. A woman's developmental stage is important as well as her relationships with people and educational and economic circumstances.

• Sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) are diseases spread through sexual contact, such as sexual intercourse, oral sex, or anal sex.
• In the U.S., the principal STDs are chlamydia, gonorrhea, genital warts, genital herpes, syphilis, hepatitis, and HIV/AIDS.

• 1. The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) is the virus that causes AIDS.
• 2. Acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) is so named because it is a disease which people acquire that is related to the body's lack of immunity; it is a syndrome because the symptoms occur together as a group.
• 4. HIV is transported in the blood, semen, and vaginal secretions of infected persons.
• 5. HIV is transmitted through the exchange of blood, through sexual contact involving semen or vaginal secretions, and prenatal, from an infected woman to her fetus.

• 8. The presence of HIV can be detected through antibody testing. HIV antibodies develop between one and six months after infection.
• Abstinence is the best protection from AIDS and
HIV: Sexually active people need to talk about
AIDS in an open, non-judgmental way and use condoms.

• Sexual responsibility is important because we have so many sexual choices.
• Sexual responsibility includes:
• 1. disclosure of intentions,
• 2. freely and mutually agreed-upon sexual activities,
• 3. use of mutually agreed-upon contraception in sexual intercourse if pregnancy is not intended,
• 4. use of safe-sex practices,
• 5. disclosure of infection from or exposure to
AIDS, and
• 6. acceptance of the consequences of sexual behavior.
• Responsibility is facilitated when sex takes place within the context of an ongoing relationship.