Study finds sex differences in relationship between arousal and orientation

Northwestern University psychologist J. Michael Bailey, PhD, says he is used to getting attention, both positive and negative, for his research on sexual orientation. "It always provokes mixed reactions," he says. But when an article titled "Federally funded study measures porn arousal" appeared in The Washington Times last December and described in unflattering terms a study conducted with his graduate student Meredith Chivers, he was unusually frustrated, he says. Conservative radio and television shows picked up the story, but because the study was under review, he couldn't explain why it wasn't the boondoggle it had been made out to be.

The purpose of the study, says Bailey, was to explore a basic question about the relationship between sexual arousal and sexual orientation that has its roots in studies conducted in the 1960s. That research, says Bailey, showed that heterosexual and gay men could be distinguished on the basis of their erectile response to pictures of nude men and women. The effect is so robust, he notes, that it can be used forensically to detect men's sexual orientation, and it probably plays a significant role in shaping men's self-identification as gay or heterosexual.

But similar research on women has not been conducted until very recently. Now, however, new evidence has emerged to suggest that "category specificity," as Bailey calls it--the tendency for gay men to become aroused only to same-sex images and heterosexual men to become aroused only to opposite-sex images--is not true of women. If so, it means there are fundamental sex differences in the relationship between arousal and orientation.

In their study, Chivers and Bailey showed erotic films to heterosexual, bisexual and lesbian women while measuring their genital and subjective arousal. They found that women, unlike men, showed the same genital responses to different kinds of erotic stimuli regardless of their sexual orientation, says Bailey. Whether the films depicted two males, two females, or a male and a female engaging in sexual activity, the different groups of women in the study responded similarly.

The main message is that there is a very fundamental sex difference between sexual arousal patterns in men and women," says Bailey. The difference has implications for understanding both the phenomenology of sexual orientation--what it's like to be straight, gay or lesbian--and the process by which people learn about their orientation, says Bailey.

Note from Reclaiming Natural Manhood site:

What a pack of lies. This research would have you believe that men are hardly ever what is termed in Western parlance as 'bisexual', or that most have no sexual desire for men at all, since it would be assumed here that most men are 'heterosexuals'. 

It is exactly what the conspiracy of Forces of Heterosexualization is all about. This is a typical example of how these forces are bent upon driving out man to man intimacy from men's spaces and to give scientific credence to the isolation of man to man intimacy from erstwhile men's spaces. And mind you, Bailey is the typical representative of abuse of science by the Forces of Heterosexualisation.

- The transgendered 'heterosexuals' are not real transgenders. Its just an extension of their heterosexuality (message: heterosexuality cannot be queer). The real transgenders are the 'homosexuals'.

- There are no bisexuals in this world. Those that say they are, are lying. There are only either gays or heterosexuals (wrongly labelled by gays as 'straights').

In this researched he is doing two things:

- Reinforcing the point of view of the Forces of Heterosexualization that there is no real 'bisexuality' in this world and that most men have no sexuality for men.

- Giving space to women to like women by saying all women, irrespective of sexual orientation have similar arousal patterns. 

- Also, guys who get aroused by men are different.

It is needless to say that his sampling can do just the trick. Most Western men, especially when they are in such researches, would automatically be put off socially by images of what they term 'homosexuality'. To be frank, I myself find the 'gay' images rather a turn off, and have seldom been aroused by them.

And considering that Bailey is a dishonest scientist with ulterior motives, it is easy to see how he would manipulate his research and subjects to suit what he wants to say.

Its so ironical that Bailey can get away with saying all this rubbish, because anyone who knows the nature of men, in any society that allows men's sexuality to be relatively free, where men's spaces are strong... that it is really men who have universally a strong sexuality for men -- even when they act bisexually -- both because of social requirements of reproduction and (some) real sexual desire --, it is also true that women too are almost universally sexually aligned towards other women, but this trait is much less strong in women than in men.