Sexual and Relationship Therapy Is responsive sexual desire for ...

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Sexual and Relationship Therapy 251scale ranging from 1 ¼ never to 8 ¼ daily or more often. Problematic use ofpornography in the past year was a composite indicator including the following threeitems: (1) ‘‘I feel that my use of pornography negatively affects my sex life’’, (2) ‘‘Ifeel that I have became dependent on pornography, i.e., that I could not control myuse of pornography anymore’’ and (3) ‘‘pornography caused problems in myrelationship’’. A four-point scale, ranging from 1 ¼ not at all to 4 ¼ a great deal,was used. Because of their limited range and skewness, summed scores weredichotomized into 0 ¼ median value (of three) and 1 ¼ above median value.Downloaded by [b-on: Biblioteca do conhecimento online ISPA] at 04:47 02 November 2013ResultsMost surveyed men had attended college or a higher level of education (63.1%),followed by those who completed secondary education (35.6%). Over two-thirds ofthe men were employed full-time (72.7%), while 9.0% reported being unemployed.Although the majority of participants stated that their household incomes in the pastyear were above average (49.4%), less than a fifth of surveyed men (18.8%) reportedbelow-average incomes. Over one-third of participants (37.2%) were married, 20.0%were cohabitating, 28.7% were in a relationship but not living together with theirpartner and 14.13% stated that they were single at the time of the survey. Theparticipants’ median length of relationship/marriage was seven years (M ¼ 8.5,SD ¼ 5.60), with one-fourth of participants (25.2%) reporting a relationship ormarriage of 15 years or longer. Almost half of the surveyed men had children(48.3%). Regarding religiosity, 50.1% of participants reported that they never attendreligious services. Only 10.2% of surveyed men attended religious ceremonies moreoften than several times a year.Considering socioeconomic and sociocultural differences between the EuropeanNorth (Norway) and South (Portugal), a number of predictable differences in thesociodemographic characteristics of the two subsamples were observed. More Norwegianmen (77.7%) than Portuguese men (71.4%) were employed full-time (w 2 [4] ¼ 11.25,p 5 .05) and reported living in a cohabitating relationship (23.9 and 19.0%, respectively,w 2 [3] ¼ 24.07, p 5 .001). In addition, a substantially higher proportion of Norwegianparticipants, compared to participants in the Portuguese sample, stated that they neverattend religious services (68.7 versus 45.5%, w 2 [2] ¼ 58.71, p 5 .001).Three patterns of male sexual desireOver one-fifth of the surveyed men reported experiencing reduced sexual desire in thepast six months (n ¼ 523, 23.6%). The proportion was significantly larger (w 2 [2] ¼27.53, p 5 .001) in the Norwegian subsample (32.6%) than in the Portuguesesubsample (21.4%). Of the men who did not experience reduced desire, only 56(2.5% of the total sample – 3.4% of the Norwegian subsample and 2.3% of thePortuguese subsample) reported MRD. As expected, those with neither decreasednor responsive sexual desire, that is, men with spontaneous desire pattern,constituted the majority of participants (n ¼ 1636, 73.9%).Are men with MRD distinguishable from men with self-reported decreased desire?To assess how different the three groups of men were (particularly the participantswho reported decreased sexual desire and those who reported MRD in the past six
252A. Sˇtulhofer et al.Downloaded by [b-on: Biblioteca do conhecimento online ISPA] at 04:47 02 November 2013months), a number of univariate ANOVAs were conducted. As shown in Table 1,the groups scored significantly differently on three of the four indicators: currentlevel of sexual desire/interest (F ¼ 311.53, p 5 .001), frequency of sexual intercoursein the past three months (F ¼ 40.43, p 5 .001), and sexual satisfaction (F ¼ 140.0,p 5 .001). In all three cases, the reduced desire group differed significantly(p 5 .001) from the two other groups of men.The above findings did not seem to reflect country-specific differences in the threedomains, as no consistent between-country patterns were found. While no significantdifferences were found in current levels of sexual desire and interest, Portuguese menreported a significantly higher frequency of sex than did Norwegian participants(t[650] ¼ 4.17, p 5 .001), which may have been related to their higher sexualsatisfaction (t[611] ¼ 4.49, p 5 .001) or to a somewhat lower average age andshorter relationship duration (t[536.3] ¼74.30, p 5 .001). 1 Interestingly, Norwegianparticipants had a significantly higher frequency of masturbation (t[2207] ¼76.0, p 5 .001).Finally, there was a statistically significant difference in the proportion ofparticipants who reported that they experienced no sexual difficulties (other than‘‘lacking interest in sex’’) in the past 12 months among the three desire patterngroups (w 2 [2] ¼ 120.09, p 5 .001). Only 34.1% of participants in the reduced desiregroup reported having no sexual difficulties, in comparison to 64% in the morespontaneous desire group and 61.2% in the MRD group. The difference between themore spontaneous and MRD groups was not significant (p 5 .08).What differentiates men with more spontaneous sexual desire from men with MRD?As men characterized with MRD differed significantly and consistently fromparticipants who reported a recent decrease in sexual desire but not from those in themore spontaneous desire group, univariate and multivariate logistic analyses werecarried out to explore potential predictors of the membership in the morespontaneous versus MRD groups. The choice of independent variables, such asnegative emotions (Brotto, 2010; Meuleman & van Lankveld, 2005), specific sexualarousal pattern (McCarthy & Ginsberg, 2008; McCarthy & McDonald, 2009) andrelationship-related issues (Bancroft, 2009; Schnarch, 1991), was guided by theTable 1. Desire/interest, frequency of sexual intercourse, frequency of masturbation andsexual satisfaction among three groups of men with different sexual desire pattern.Decreaseddesire group(n ¼ 523)More spontaneousdesire group(n ¼ 1636)More responsivedesire group(n ¼ 56) Welch a /F bM (SD) M (SD) M (SD) (p5)Sexual desire/interest 4.71 (1.67) 6.54 (1.36) 6.00 (1.83) 255.96 a,c (.001)Frequency of sexual 3.69 (1.11) 4.16 (1.07) 4.41 (1.04) 38.65 a,c (.001)intercourseFrequency of 5.18 (1.56) 5.16 (1.57) 5.11 (1.82) .04 b (.95)masturbationSexual satisfaction 37.56 (8.62) 45.0 (8.59) 42.89 (9.70) 140.0 b,d (.001)Notes: a Welch test for equality of means; b F-test; c Group 1 6¼ group 2, 3 (Tamhane’s post hoc test,p 5 .001); d group 1 6¼ group 2, 3 (Bonferroni post hoc test, p 5 .001).
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