Guided imagery of female sexual assertiveness: turn on or turn off?

To test the effect of female sexual assertiveness on the subjective sexual arousal and emotional responses of 138 male undergraduates, subjects, randomly assigned by blocks, listened to audiotaped guided imagery of either a male or a female initiating a sexual invitation and a male or a female being assertive during coitus. Contrary to the claims of the "new impotence," men in the traditional male role experienced more disgust, fear, and anger and tended to experience less sexual arousal and more sadness. Whereas, men imagining women initiating sex and being coitally assertive experienced more surprise and enjoyment. These data were discussed as reflecting a new egalitarianism. More research is needed to distinguish between partisan claims of "new impotence" and "new egalitarianism."

Hostility-guilt, guilt over aggression, and self-punishment.

48 men were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups and partitioned at the median on hostility-guilt in a 2X2 factorial design. Subjects in the experimental condition were induced to aggress verbally by severely derogating a stranger in a study of first impressions. Before and after participating in the first impressions study, the subjects participated in a pain tolerance procedure involving receiving a series of increasingly painful electric shocks. Affect adjective checklists measured guilt and other affects at four times before and after each pain tolerance procedure. As expected, high-hostility-guilt men increased in affective guilt following participation in the experimental condition in which they unfairly distressed a stranger. As expected, the affective guilt of these same high-hostility-guilt men declined after submitting to a procedure measuring pain tolerance. Contrary to expectations, low-hostility-guilt men tolerated more pain in the experimental condition than did high-hostility-guilt men.

Awareness in Gestalt sex therapy.

Awareness is conceived to be selective, curative, a method, a prescription for ideal living, and a ground for human existence. In this paper the following gestalt awareness methods are described: continuum of awareness, awareness questions, biobehavioral feedback, directed awareness, concentration, present-centering, taking responsibilty, and shuttles in awareness. The use of these methods is illustrated in a gestalt therapy dialogue. The application of awareness as concept and method to sensate focus and to the treatment of the prematurely ejaculating male is discussed. Shuttles in awareness and the shared continua of awareness are introduced as promising new methods in the treatment of sexual dysfunction and as enhancing sexual pleasure and communion.

The gestalt experiment in sex therapy.

The couple with a sex dysfunction is at an impasse. The natural process of sexual self-regulation is interrupted by the self. Growth requires experimenting with new solutions for unsolved problems. The gestalt experiment is a major modality of treatment applicable to sex therapy. To experiment is to invent and discover solutions and to find and make meanings. In posing an experiment, the therapist attempts to create a safe emergency in which risk and support are balanced, permitting the person to stay with the mounting excitement and coming solution. An atmosphere of playfulness and creativity invites experimentation. Thorough familiarity with modes and methods of experimenting permits the therapist's creativity to emerge. Applications of sexual metaphors and sex dysfunction as a nightmare are presented which use methods drawn from gestalt dream work. The use of gestalt experiments are illustrated in a client-therapist dialogue.

Negative attitudes toward masturbation in sex therapy.

The incidence of masturbation in males and females as reported by Kinsey was cited as basic data to support Gagnon and Simon's theoretical conceptions of differences in the psychosexual development of males and females. The use of masturbation as treatment in sex therapy was reviewed. An inventory to measure negative attitudes toward masturbation was described, and four research studies supporting its construct validity was summarized. The affective-cognitive structure of masturbation-guilt was posited to inhibit masturbatory behavior and to elicit negative affects such as guilt and disgust as a consequence of masturbation. The use of the inventory measuring negative attitudes toward masturbation was illustrated using the P-LI-SS-IT model. Intensive therapy from a gestalt sex therapy perspective was illustrated as integrating the negative masturbatory schema into self-regulating awareness-expression cycles. A caution to sex therapists alerted them to the importance of awareness of emotions, fantasy, and sociosexual meanings in sex therapy rather than using masturbation as a packaged technique.

An empirical investigation of experimentally induced masturbatory fantasies.

The nature and correlates of experimentally induced masturbatory fantasies were studied. Subjects were requested to construct a story using the film of either a male or a female masturbating to orgasm as the eliciting stimulus. Results indicated that there are many sex differences in masturbatory fantasies which are most likely a consequence of the differential ability of men and women to form a positive projective identification with the same-sex protagonist in a film of masturbation as well as a function of the variations in the process by which men and women assimilate masturbation into a larger set of social meanings. The findings also attest to the ability of sex guilt and negative attitudes toward masturbation to account for the variability in masturbatory fantasies in a theoretically consistent and reliable manner.

Personality correlates of the Mosher Guilt Scales.

Examined the relationship between sex guilt, hostility guilt, and morality-conscience guilt, and more traditional concepts in personality, to extend the construct validational work of the Mosher Guilt Scales. This was achieved by correlating the scores of the three guilt subscales with the 15 manifest needs of the Edwards Personal Preference Schedule. The results indicate that while there was some overlap between the guilt scores and the manifest needs, the association was usually a function of theoretically consistent relationships rather than duality of constructs. These findings, and the literature review of the Mosher Guilt Scales, are interpreted as supporting the continued use of the three guilt subscales as well as suggesting that guilt is a personality variable of considerable theoretical significance.

The Gestalt awareness-expression cycle as a model for sex therapy.

Conceptual models and treatment modalities generally used in Gestalt therapy are specifically applicable to sex therapy. Healthy sexual functioning requires self-regulation in which the person becomes aware of the dominant need in the situation and expresses himself to satisfy that need and to complete the Gestalt. The Gestalt awareness-expression cycle is a model for understanding both the processes of sexual functioning and dysfunction and of the therapeutic encounter. The concepts of awareness, excitement, action, and contact as components of the cycle are related conceptually both to modes and points of interruption of self-regulation and to specific treatment modalities and methods. Three major modalities of Gestalt therapy, awareness, experiment, and contactful encounter, and illustrative Gestalt methods are introduced in the context of sex therapy.