Shame, Sexual Compulsivity, and Eroticizing Flirtatious Others: An Experimental Study

Abstract

Clinical observation and correlational studies with nonclinical samples suggest that a linkage between negative affective states (especially shame) and engagement in erotic pursuits typifies sexual compulsivity. The present study tested whether experimental induction of shame leads to increased interest in erotically suggestive targets among more sexually compulsive individuals. A total of 74 age-traditional heterosexual university students first recalled either an emotionally neutral or a shame-inducing personal experience, then completed a nonpredictive gaze-cueing task featuring flirtatious or emotionally neutral faces of the same or opposite sex. They also rated the faces’ attractiveness and completed a validated sexual compulsivity scale and two control measures (executive control, sociosexuality). Higher (versus lower) sexual compulsivity predicted weaker gaze-triggered attentional orienting in response to the flirtatious opposite-sex face in the shame (versus neutral) condition, and this was accounted for by (higher) attractiveness ratings of the flirtatious opposite-sex face. Shame thus appears to increase sexualization (i.e., reduces salience of agentic features and increases appeal of physical attributes) of erotically suggestive targets among more sexually compulsive individuals.

Notes

¹Although the tasks were administered in this fixed order across all participants, it is unlikely that order affected the reported results for two reasons. First, the comparison of interest, which drove the significant effects we report, involved the gaze-cueing effects elicited by opposite-sex flirtatious faces in participants in the neutral versus the shame condition: Participants in both conditions saw these target faces in the first gaze-cueing block. Second, the complementary interactive effect of condition and sexual compulsivity emerged in the explicit attractiveness rating task in which the presentation of the four faces was randomized across participants.

Note. SCS = Sexual Compulsivity Scale.