Critical Issues in Teaching Human Sexuality to Graduate Social Work Students

Abstract

After discussing the rationale and procedures by which a course in human sexuality was introduced the authors discuss some of the critical issues that developed during the teaching of the material. It was found that desensitizing became a major factor in integration of course content, and that graduate students needed time to discuss their own feelings about sexual issues. During the several times this course was taught, it became increasingly evident that students often diagnosed pathology based on their own attitudes toward specific sexual activities, and had to learn to use other criteria for more objective assessments.