Sexuality Assessment of the Brazilian Population: An Integrative Review of the Available Instruments

Abstract

This paper provides an integrative review of psychometric instruments targeting sexual function and clinical measures of sexuality available to the Brazilian population. Our aim was to summarize the existing measures, indicating current development needs related to the quality of psychometric evidence, research design and untapped theoretical ground that could be relevant for clinical practice and research in sexuality. Electronic databases were searched. Additional records were found through a manual search. The general search terms and operators were (scale OR inventory OR questionnaire) AND (validation) AND (sexual beliefs OR sexuality OR sexual behavior OR sexual function OR sexual satisfaction) AND (Brazil or Brazilian). The results indicate a total of 18 developed or transculturally adapted and/or validated scales and questionnaires available in Brazilian Portuguese, covering sexual dysfunctions and clinical measures. Despite development, adaptation and validation efforts, there is a critical need for better psychometric and sampling strategies as well as norms for the clinical interpretation of test results. Ecological validity is also a challenge. At present, sexual assessments in Brazil offer some useful information, but reaching the applied clinical field remains a challenge.

Supplemental data for this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/0092623X.2022.2035869 .

Keywords:

• Surveys and questionnaires
• sexuality
• Brazil
• sexual function

Author contributions

The first and second authors of this review carefully screened, extracted, and selected the articles included in this study. All authors gave their substantial contributions to this study’s conceptualization, design, and data acquisition. All authors helped draft or critically revise the article for important intellectual content and gave their final approval for the version to be published. All authors agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to its accuracy or integrity are appropriately investigated and resolved.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.