NCJ Number
164747
Journal
Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment Volume: 8 Issue: 4 Dated: (October 1996) Pages: 279-289
Date Published
1996
Length
11 pages
Annotation
The aim of this study was to verify whether relationships exist in sexual aggressors between affective components (moods and emotions following conflicts) and sexual behaviors (fantasies and masturbatory activities during such fantasies).
Abstract
The authors developed the "Fantasy Report," a self- assessment method for recording affective components and sexual behaviors. Nineteen rapists, 12 heterosexual pedophiles, and eight homosexual pedophiles completed the Fantasy Report every 2 days for 2 months. In rapists and heterosexual pedophiles, negative moods and conflicts coincided with overwhelming deviant sexual fantasies and increased masturbatory activities during such fantasies. For the homosexual pedophiles, the data showed a significant relationship only between affective components and deviant sexual fantasies. The emotions most often reported were anger, loneliness, and humiliation by the rapists, loneliness and humiliation by the heterosexual pedophiles, and loneliness by the homosexual pedophiles. Although the results of this study as well as those of McKibben et al. suggest that emotional dysphoria (negative mood and negative emotion due to conflicts) is a precursor of deviant sexual behaviors (fantasizing, masturbation) in sexual aggressors, the study cannot definitively establish a causal relationship between these two variables on the basis of the data; nevertheless, in accordance with Pithers' relapse prevention model, the authors postulate that such a link exists. 1 table and 16 references