What is the “Sex” in Sex Addiction? Problem Behaviors Reported Among Those Endorsing Compulsive Sexual Behavior

Abstract

Recent years have seen a surge in research related to compulsive, excessive, or out-of-control sexual behaviors. Yet, little is known about which behaviors people might experience as compulsive. Using YouGov America, a non-probability sample was collected, matched to U.S. representative norms, stratified, and weighted based on sample characteristics to ensure representativeness (N = 2,806; Mean Age = 48.9, SD = 17.3). Participants reported if they had experienced any concerns about their sexual behaviors being either “out of control” or “an addiction.” Participants who endorsed such concerns were then asked to indicate which behaviors had led to such concerns, using a checklist of 11 potentially overlapping sexual behaviors (e.g. frequent casual sexual encounters, using apps to find sexual partners). Men—both heterosexual and gay/bi/other–were more likely to report concerns that their sexual behaviors were an addiction, relative to heterosexual women. Relative to heterosexual women, men of any sexual orientation were more likely to report pornography use as a specific behavior of concern, and less likely to report partnered sexual behaviors. More religious participants were more likely to endorse masturbation as a behavior of concern and less likely to endorse frequent casual sexual encounters.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest regarding this work and attest that no portion of this work has been previously disseminated or published elsewhere.

Ethical statement

Ethical approval for this project has been granted via the Bowling Green State University Institutional Review Board.

Notes

1 Comparisons of YouGov with traditional non-probability and probability survey vendors (e.g., PEW research center), consistently find that the quality and representativeness of data from YouGov matches or exceeds those same metrics among true probability vendors (Rivers, 2016). Blinded analyses of non-probability and probability vendors (Kennedy et al., 2016), conducted by PEW Research, clearly demonstrated that YouGov outperformed all other vendors, including PEW’s own probability sampling service.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded via grants from the International Center for Responsible Gaming, the Problem Gambling Network of Ohio, and the Kindbridge Research Institute awarded to JBG and SWK. The funders had no role in design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript; and decision to submit the manuscript for publication.