Masters' and Johnson's Human Sexual Response

Masters' and Johnson's Human Sexual Response is a report on the authors' long-term study of the anatomy and physiology of human sexual response conducted during the years 1954-66. The authors' preface briefly addresses the climate of fear and suspicion that had surrounded all previous attempts at such investigation and deplores the lack of a supportive response from the biological or psychological science communities for projects of this type. Their study, limited in this volume to the clinical examination of the nature of sexual response, is presented as "a first step toward an open-door policy" and future research based in "investigative objectivity" (vii). It follows from the initial investigations of sexual behavior conducted by Kinsey from 1938 to 1952 which, as the authors note, did include questions of physiology and anatomy. In order to achieve a comprehensive understanding of human sexuality, however, the physical reactions of males and females "responding to effective sexual stimulation" have to be clear and the reasons for their behavior in response to the stimulation have to be discovered (4). Masters' and Johnson's study was designed to establish a solid base of scientific information from which answers to these questions could be determined. Their entire project was oriented toward the provision of adequate data from which therapists could begin to formulate approaches to the treatment of human sexual inadequacy.

The study was conducted in various stages

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But their work involved so few subjects that any results would be "too meager statistically to be of any significance," and neither the information gathered in intake reports (619 F, 654 M) nor the observational data assembled on the sexual response of active participants (382 F, 312 M) was subjected to statistical analysis (20). The researchers observed the subjects and recorded sexual activity during "manual and mechanical manipulation, natural coition with the female partner in supine, superior, or knee-chest position and, for many female study subjects, artificial coition in supine and knee-chest positions" (21). The range of activities was selected on the basis of achieving maximum observational access. Artificial coital equipment, plastic penises "developed with the same optics as plate glass," was employed because, with cold-light illumination, observation and recording could be accomplished without visual distortion (21). Though the researchers observed hundreds of cycles of artificial coition no subject was ever capable of achieving orgasm via fantasy. The researchers established a protocol for the gradual introduction of subjects into the program, and during this training period "established a sense of security

Category: Psychology - M