Psychology of sex - Total No. of Records in System :: 2032

PSYCHOLOGY fJ FSEXsemblance, though it often suffices to delude the subjectthe affinities of hyperaesthesiaare with weakness.of it;Abnormal sexual hyperaesthesia may occur before pubertyas well as in old age. It probably plays an importantpart in the constitution of various deviations, for it isonly when an abnormal sexual excitation coincides withan abnormal state of hyperaesthesiathat there is any likelihoodof a perversesexual association being formed.When sexual hyperaesthesia exists, anything connectedwith persons of the opposite sex, or even any non-sexualobject or action which seems to show analogies to sexualobjects and acts, arouses sexual associations and producessexual feelings. Any part of the body, the garments evenapart from the wearer, any unusual attitude or posture,however apart from sexual ends, the coitus o animalsand even of insects, anything in nature or in art whichrecalls the penis or the vulva or the act of coitus, all becomenot merely sexual symbols, as they normally may,but are apt actively to arouse sexual emotions. In suchgeneral sexual hyperaesthesiathere is no choice and allsuggestions are liable to be aroused indiscriminately. Butthe soil is thus furnished on which particular fetichismsmay take root and flourish, though this is not usually theway in which fetichisms arise. It may be added that sexualhyperaesthesia may exist in a disguised form, and evenwithout the active participation of the subject. Pruderyis a form of sexual hyperaesthesia. The exaggerated horrorof sexual things, as well as the exaggerated love of them,alike rest on a basis of sexual hypersesthesia.Sexual hyperaesthesia, while it is abnormal, and apt tobe associated with neuropathic conditions, isby no meansnecessarily a manifestation of insanity; it can be restrainedand concealed, and it is more or less under the controlof the will. In its more extreme degrees, however, when