This summary includes all course material, including lectures, mini-lectures, previous-years presentations, quiz solutions, and the entire book of the course - Understanding Human Sexuality (15th edition).
There could be some minor mistakes such as typos, I apologize for those.
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Thank you for your message. Although there are all concepts included in the summary,there is no picture and visual diagram at all. It is being difficult to comprehend and memorize the concepts particularly with the biological terms.
By: solutiont • 2 weeks ago
Thank you for your review. Could you tell me what is not up to your standards?
By: solutiont • 2 weeks ago
Ah I understand - due to copyright reasons, only my own contribution was included. For the exam, I studied theoretical parts from here only, and pictures/diagrams I googled as they are better than the ones from the book. Sorry you were not satisfied! I was just sharing what helped me, and the lack of visuals was seen in the preview, too.
By: troyler006 • 1 year ago
By: solutiont • 1 year ago
Thank you!
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Content preview
Sexology
Chapter 1 – Sexuality in Perspective
Sex – sexual anatomy and sexual behavior
Gender – being male, female, or something else
Gender binary – gender as having two categories – male and female
Sexual behavior – behavior that produces arousal and increases the chance of
orgasm
Religion and sexuality
Greek myth about original humans being double creatures split in half – that is
how they explained sexuality
Fifteenth-century Christians – ‘wet dreams ‘ resulted from intercourse with tiny
spiritual creatures – sodomy
Muslim – sexual intercourse as the finest pleasure of life
Science and sexuality
Anton van Leeuwenhoek – sperm swimming in semen
Oskar Hertwig – fertilization of egg
Freud – sexuality as primary force in motivation of all human behavior and the
principal cause of all forms of neurosis
Peter Gay
Henry Havelock Ellis – women are also sexual creatures, sexual deviations
are often harmless, masturbation is common, physical and psychological
factors play role in problems – Studies in the Psychology of Sex
Richard von Krafft-Ebing – pathological sexuality, terms sadism, masochism,
pedophilia, homo/heterosexuality, sexual disorders based on patients’
experiences
, Magnus Hirschfeld – first sex research institute, term transvestite,
administered the first large-scale sex survey obtaining data from 10 000
people on a 130-item questionnaire – destroyed by Nazis
Alfred Kinsey – sexual orientation on a 7-point scale, Kinsey Reports
Masters and Johnson – observational sex research, physiology of sexual
response and sexual disorders
The media
- Cultivation theory – what is seen in the media represents real life
- Framing theory (agenda setting) – media draws attention to certain topics
and not to others
- Social cognitive theory – the idea that the media provide role models whom
we imitate
- Selectivity – people pay attention only to certain media and their messages,
and not to others
- Reinforcing spiral theory – social identities and ideologies predict media
use, which in turn affects our identities
- Different susceptibility model – not everyone reacts the same to the same
media exposure
Cross-cultural perspectives on sexuality
- Ethnocentrism – the tendency to regard one’s own culture as superior, its
own customs are the standard by which other cultures should be judged
- all societies regulate sexual behavior in some way
- incest taboo - regulations prohibiting sexual interaction between blood
relatives are nearly universal
- condemnation of forced sexual relations
- societies respond differently to
o kissing – 54% of cultures do not do it sexually
o cunnilingus
o inflicting pain
o frequency of intercourse
o masturbation – sometimes accepted, sometimes not
o premarital and extramarital sex
o sex with same-gender partners
- variation in human sexual behavior
- places personal standards and behavior in perspective
- provides evidence concerning the importance of culture and learning in the
shaping of sexual behavior
In the US
, - differences in pill usage, cohabitation unions, premarital cohabitation that
transitions to marriage, first marriages for men that are intact at 20
- ethnic group variations
o differences in African American and White people in the US (marriage
difference, difference in oral sex, etc.)
o Latinx – machismo, marianismo, familismo – cultural valuing of family
o Asians – collectivism, conformity to norms, emotional control, yin and
yang to describe sexuality in China
o American Indians – historical trauma (Cumulative psychological
wounding passed down across generations as a result of massive
group trauma.)
Cross-species perspectives on sexuality
- Other mammals also – masturbate, show same-sex behavior, sexual signaling
- Sexual behavior – in lower species controlled hormonally, in higher species by
the brain
- Sexual behavior can also be used non-sexually
Sexual health: A state of physical, emotional, mental, and social well- being in
relation to sexuality.
Sexual rights: Basic, inalienable rights regarding sexuality, both positive and
negative, such as rights to reproductive self-determination and sexual self-
expression and freedom from sexual abuse and violence.
Chapter 2 – Theoretical Perspectives on Sexuality
Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology are evolutionary theories.
Sociobiology – application of evolutionary biology to understanding the social
behavior of animals
Evolution – all living things have acquired their present forms through
gradual changes in their genetic endowment over successive generations –
what counts is producing a lot of healthy, viable offspring who will carry on
one’s genes – identifying healthy mates, courtship patterns, family structure
and infant vulnerability
Natural selection – a process in nature resulting in greater survival of those
best adapted to environment
Infants are more likely to survive if the parents love each other (pair-bond)
and if the child can be attached to parents
, Parental investment – behaviors invested in the offspring by the parent that
increase the offspring’s chance of survival
Sexual selection – creates differences between males and females
- Consists of – competition amongst members of one gender,
preferential choice by members of the other gender
Criticism – biological determinism, outmoded version of evolutionary
theory (not focused on group survival), central function of sex is believed
to be reproduction
Evolutionary psychology – focuses on psychological mechanisms that have been
shaped by evolution – every characteristic we observe must have some adaptive
significance
- Sexual strategies – short-term vs long-term mating – intrasexual competition
for access to mates
- Criticism – men and women similar in their preferences, not everything has
adaptive significance
Gender neutral evolutionary theory
- Patricia Gowaty
- given varied environments, it is not adaptive for humans to display fixed
behaviors—or fixed gender differences in behavior—determined by
evolution
- evolution has selected for flexibility and adaptability
Psychoanalytic theory, learning theory, social exchange theory and cognitive theory
are psychological theories.
Psychoanalytic theory – basic assumption that part of human personality is
unconscious, Freud
- saw sex as one of the key forces in human life
- libido – sex drive, one of two major motivating forces for human behavior
(and Thanatos – death instinct)
- id – pleasure principle, basic part, present at birth, has libido
- ego – reality principle, keeps id in line, realistic, rational
- superego – conscience, values and ideals of society that we learn, operates
on idealism, striving for moral goals
- erogenous zones – areas of the body particularly sensitive to sexual
stimulation
- Oedipus
complex –
sexual attraction
of a little boy for
his mother
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