What Was the Design of This Study

What was the design of this study?

- The purpose of this study was to investigate: a. whether how and why men pretend orgasm and b. what men and women reports of pretending orgasm reveal about their sexual scripts and the functions of orgasms within these scripts.

- Participants were 180 male, and 101 female college students

- The participants for this study used a qualitative questionnaire anonymously.

What did the researchers (Sheena Shippee and me) find about the percentages of women and men who reported having pretended orgasm?

- More women than men pretend faking orgasms, but a large percent of men did admit that they had faked an orgasm as before.

o 25% of the male participants admitted to faking an orgasm

o 50% of the female participants admitted to faking an orgasm

What gender differences and similarities were found?

- Consistent with a gender similarities perspective, the researchers asked both men and women about pretending, rather then assuming that only women pretended. Both women and men reported having pretended, often for similar reasons

- Both men and women narratives suggested a sexual script in which the woman should orgasm first and when the man orgasms, sex is over

What implications of the study did we discuss? What sexual scripts did the study identify.

Sexual scripts:

- Implications:

o Studying pretending can sometimes tell us more about the script than studying actual behavior because when people pretend, they are acting out what they think is supposed to happen. It can also tell us about the perceived outcomes or orgasm or a lack of an orgasm.

- Participants' responses provided insights into their sexual scripts, as well as insights into how these scripts influenced pretending orgasms. Men and women's scripts often seemed complementary

o Some of the scripts included:

 The sequence of events: she orgasms then he orgasms and sex is over...or the women orgasm at the same time as the man

 Sex=intercourse, and orgasms should occur during intercourse...the researchers found evidence that many men and women felt pressure to orgasm during intercourse

 It is the man's job to give the woman an orgasm

 Men always want sex and women should accommodate men's voracious sex drive

As discussed in class, do ALL women and men prefer that during heterosexual intercourse, the woman should orgasm before the man?

- In class, we said that it depends on the individual. ...research show that sexual scripts that come into play, the woman is preferred to have an orgasm first.

Week 13--April 17 & 19, 2012. What Should Be Considered Sexually Coercive or Abusive? Adults

Muehlenhard, Charlene L., & Peterson, Zoë D. (2004). Conceptualizing sexual violence: Socially acceptable coercion and other controversies. In Arthur G. Miller (Ed.), The social psychology of good and evil: Understanding our capacity for kindness and cruelty (pp. 240 268). New York: Guilford.

Sex Matters:

Chapter 6. Sexual Practices.

Reading 29. Laura Kipnis. Against Love: A Treatise on the Tyranny of Two, pp. 293-297.

Melissa Travis. Asexuality, pp. 297-298.

Chapter 10: Sexual Violence

Spotlight on Research: An Interview with Diana E. H. Russell, pp. 466-468.

Reading 46. Nicola Gavey. "I Wasn't Raped, but ... " Revisiting Definitional Problems in Sexual Victimization, pp. 469-478.

Denise Donnelly. BDSM or Intimate Violence: How Do You Tell the Difference? p. 478.

Reading 47. Sexual Assault on Campus: A Multilevel, Integrative Approach to Party Rape, by Armstrong, Hamilton, & Sweeney, pp. 480-493.

Mindy Stombler. Linking Sexual Aggression and Fraternities, pp. 493-494.

Reading 48. Effects of Rape on Men: A Descriptive Analysis, by Jayne Walker, John Archer, and Michelle Davies, pp. 495-504.

Denise Donnelly. Women Raping Men, p. 505.

Reading 49. Rape and War: Fighting Men and Comfort Women, by Joane Nagel, pp. 506-511.

What did Muehlenhard and Peterson say about conceptualizing rape?

- Anyone involved in studying or preventing sexual violence needs to make decisions that are more likely to be controversial-decisions that reflect values and implicit or explicit theories about power, violence, sexuality and gender. In the paper Muehlenhard and Peterson discussed the controversies about defining sexual violence, the dilemmas surrounding where to focus research and prevention efforts- on victims, perpetrators, or society; and they also discussed the issues involved in acknowledging that sexual violence does not have uniformly severe consequences.

- Defining consensual sex as requiring a feeling of willing: it is problematic to define rape as sex without verbally communicated consent. What about defining rape as sex without verbally or nonverbally communicated consent

* All of these thing come into play when conceptualizing rape

o Conditions surrounding complicating consent

o Distinguishing between consensual sex and wanted sex---unwanted consensual sex also occurs

o The role of gender: sexual violence is not gender neutral. More women than men experience sexual violence and more men than woman perpetuate sexual violence

As discussed in this chapter and in class, what are the difficulties of conceptualizing rape in terms of force and in terms of consent?

- If rape is defined as using coercion to obtain sex from another person, it is necessary to distinguish between coercive and non-coercive forms of influence. In some cases the distinction is fairly non-controversial but it other cases it is extremely controversial.

- Some definitions of rape are written in terms of force.