Theoretical Perspectives Flashcards
What is a theory?
- Set of ideas or concepts that help explain behaviour and
attitudes - No “unified field theory” of human sexuality not one theory
Evolutionary Perspective
Evolution through natural selection
* Natural selection
* Sociobiology
Examples
* Physical attractiveness
* Parental investment(step vs biological parents)
Conclusion/critique
-based on outdated ideas
-idea that sex is for reproduction and that is it
they dont tell the who story
Psychoanalytic Theory
Freud
Key concepts:
* Libido(sexual drive)
* Stages of psychosexual
development
* fixation
Evaluation
* non testable - implicit belifs/urges
* a lot of his theories are based on his patients so maybe for those people who had some problems it would apply but for the healthy population it would not
but he did explore the idea of sexuallity at a time of great opression so quite revolutionary
Erogenous Zones
An erogenous zone is a part of the skin or mucous membrane that is extremely sensitive
to stimulation;
touching it in certain ways produces feelings of pleasure.
The lips and mouth
are one such erogenous zone, the genitals a second, and the rectum and anus a third.
Psychosexual Development
1-oral stage
2.anal stage (elimination)
3.3.phalic stage 3-6 (touching the phallics)
Oedipus complex
The boy’s hostility toward his father grows, but eventually he comes to
fear that his father will retaliate by castrating him—cutting off his prized penis. Thus, the boy
feels castration anxiety. Eventually, the castration anxiety becomes so great that he stops
desiring his mother and shifts to identifying with his father, taking on the father’s gender
role and acquiring the characteristics expected of males by society.
e female Oedipus complex
The little girl realizes, perhaps after observing her father or her brother,
that she has no penis. She feels envious and cheated, and she suffers from penis envy,
Thus, she shifts her desire for her mother onto her father, forming the female Oedipus complex
latency, which lasts until adolescence
During this stage, the
sexual impulses are repressed or are in a quiescent state, and so nothing much happens
sexually
Learning Theories
Classical conditioning (Pavlov)
- Key concepts: US, UR, CS, CR: dogs
- dog + meat=salivation
- dog+bell=salivation
- dog+bell+meat=salivation
- dog+ bell=salivation
if u are presented thing non-sexual things during sex for a period of time ur response to them will become sexual -due to antecipation
Social Exchange Theory
cost vs rewards
Learning Theories
Operant conditioning (Skinner)
* Primary reinforcement(reward/punishment)
* Dual role of sex(can be the reward or the behaviour that is rewarded or punished)
Social learning (Bandura)
* Key concepts: observational learning, identification(identify with the model), imitation, self-efficacy(rewards/punished)
Criticisms
-learning theory ignore cognitive processes
Cognitive Theories
Perceptions and evaluation of events (i.e., thoughts) affect emotions and responses
- Examples:
“I’m not in the mood” - interpretation of a partner saying that
Erectile difficulties
-interpretation of it happened once is fine or it happened may be a have a problem
Cognitive Schema
Schema: General knowledge framework that a
person has about a particular topic
ex:a dog is on all 4s and have fur
photos that goes a long with original scheamas are better remenber than those that dont
Perception of events affected by schema
* E.g., gender schema (Bem)
Sociological Perspective
sociaty/culture
Socialization leads to:
* Shared sexual scripts (Script Theory)
we learn through culture how to act
ex: women ask if men want to come up and then they have sex,kissing-hand on brest-sex-orgasm
