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Sexual Orientation:
Identity, Fantasy, and Behavior
By Mitchell Tepper, Ph.D., M.P.H.
With the premiere of “The L Word,” Showtime’s answer to the great success
of HBO’s primarily heterosexual “Sex in the City,” there is bound to be
more talk around the water cooler about sexual orientation. When it comes
to same-sex relationships, reactions from those who are unfamiliar with
what it means to be anything other than heterosexual range from confused
to curious to aroused. That’s to be expected when we live in a world that
sees complex issues as black and white.
Confusion and questioning start off because of this “black and white” or
binary thinking - we are male or female; gay or straight. Bisexual people
are often seen as “confused.” People in different-sex relationships who
have a same-sex experience or are just attracted to people of the same sex
are labeled bisexual or gay, even if they don’t identify that way
themselves. Anything except gay or straight is difficult to understand,
and more difficult to accept.
The main reason why sexual orientation is a difficult concept for many to
get their arms around is because the answer to “what is sexual
orientation?” is a fluid one. Many people who consider themselves
heterosexual or straight may fantasize, think, or have dreams during sleep
about having sex with someone of the same gender. People who identify as
gay or lesbian may fantasize about having sex with someone of a different
gender. These feelings can be confusing, yielding questions like, “But I
thought you said you were…?” This confusion is natural, especially given
that we have all been brought up in a world that values labels, boxes, and
categories. Flexibility and fluidity, therefore, are often misunderstood
and even feared.
In the 1950s, sexologist Alfred Kinsey devised a seven-point scale to
describe the continuum of sexual orientation. The scale was based on
interviews of thousands of people and their answers to questions regarding
their sexual behavior, fantasies, dream content, degree of response to
seeing the same sex both clothed and nude, seeing genitalia, and thinking
about the same sex (e.g., “Are you sexually aroused by thinking about men
or some particular man?").
Zero on the Kinsey Scale represented a person who identified as
heterosexual at the time of the interview and reported no same-sex
behavior, no masturbation fantasy about someone of the same sex, no
dreams, no responses to visuals depicting people of the same sex, and no
response to thinking about the same sex. Six represented a person who
identified as homosexual and reported no heterosexual behavior, fantasies,
and so on.
What Kinsey and his associates found was that some people’s ratings on the
scale fluctuated throughout their lives. According to one researcher, a
person could be a “Kinsey zero” from puberty to fifteen, then a “one” from
16 to 17, dropping back to a “zero” from age 18 to 29, and then be a “two”
at ages 30 to 37. People have a tendency to fluctuate more from puberty
until their early 20s but some “come out” with a different sexual identity
after many years living a different one that they and others may have
thought was set.
So remember these points the next time you are chatting with your friends
about an episode of “The L Word:”
• When it comes to sexual orientation, identity, fantasy, and behavior are
not always in sync.
• Confusion about irreconcilable differences among these components of
orientation arises when we expect the nature of sexual orientation to be
fixed.
• Arousal doesn’t dictate identity but may influence fantasy or behavior.
• Worries about our own sexual orientation or that of others usually
result from messages we hear that value one way of sexual loving over
another.
• Variety is the spice of life! |
