Male Homosexualtiy
A study by the Kinsey group at Indiana University between 1938 and 1953 found that 37 percent of the male interviewed has shared in at least one homosexual sexual experience which resulted in orgasm for themselves or their partner. When looking at only males that were in college or graduate school programs, the study found that 30 percent had taken part in a homosexual sexual activity where either themselves or their partner reached orgasm. However, 16 percent had had no such activity since the age of fifteen. Of the remainder, an additional third (9 percent of the total) had experienced all of their homosexual acts either during adolescence or before they reached 20 years of age (Gagnon & Simon, 1973). Thus, homosexual sexual experience, at least from this study, seems to be confined to adolescence and isolated experiences in the latter years.
On of the theories regarding homosexuality is that explanations are located in the structure of the family and its malfunctions. Irving Bieber conducted studies on a group of male homosexuals. He found that there was a large proportion who had mothers who were described as close binding and intimate, and fathers who were detached and hostile. This could be used to argue that the mothers have selected their child for special overprotection and seductive care. When combining this with Fruedian arguement, the father is then alienated, becomes hostile towards the child, and fails to become a masculine role-figure for the child.
There are complications arising from Bieber's theories that overprotective mothers and lack of bounding with the male as a result of this. Assumptions are made that there is a certain relationship between the development of masculinity and feminity and heterosexualtiy and homosexuality. Also assumed are the sexual roles of the homosexual are modeled after heterosexuals, and that these roles are the rule, widespread and well-known. Living in a post-Freudian world, we are concerned with castration anxiety, anal and oral fixations, and the Oedipus complex. However, our biographies are not fixed, but ever changing, undergoing revision and editing. We are placing too much emphasis on what happened in the past to create who we are now. What happened to the child to create homosexuality is the frequently asked question. We never ask why another is heterosexual, or try to determine what occurred in their past that led them to their present sexual preference. What the original causes were may not even be very important for the patterns of homosexuality observed in a society. The patterns of adult homosexuality are resultant upon social structures and values surrounding the homosexual after he/she preceives him/herself as homosexual (Gagnon & Simon, 1973).
Experiences in early childhood occur that influences the development of our own sexuality. But, these experiences influence much more than just sexual development. There are key processes during infancy that are central to the development of the child, and which serve as the basis for sexual identity. Some of these experiences are primarily sensations, which help bring about a sense of the body and its capacities for pleasure and comfort. There are also experiences that will influence the child's ability to relate to other bodies. To begin to experience pleasure and comfort, and the opposite, is essential to the start of making connections between the sexual and the sentimental. These connections are broad and overlap each other. They provide the earliest learning and expressions of social learning to the child.
Social learning gives rise to gender identification early on in life. It is the parent's decision to raise the child as a male or female, and it is the most significant labeling experience the child will ever undergo. Thus, the belief in which gender role the child is will have permenant consequences for the child throughout life. Identity is defined by anatomy, the placement of one's genitals on the body. However, gender roles are not established simply be the doctor pronouncing "You have a girl (or boy)." The roles are learned over time, by experiences throughout childhood. Contributions to the development of the child as masculine or feminine are the frequency of father-child and mother-child interaction, tolerance of aggression in males and not females, and the vigor of play. It is commonly thought that gender role is set by the age of two, and attempts to change has negative psychic consequences on the child (Gagnon & Simon, 1973). Green (1987) found that 80 percent of children by the age of two were able to correctly identify their gender. About two-thirds of yound children understand that they cannot change sex (Green, 1987).
There is evidence that hormonal effects on the mother's nervous system during pregnancy may play are role in assigning gender identity. Those receiving lowered amounts of hormones from the parent may give rise to the child having problems identifying with their gender role. Normal amounts are thought to ready the child to receive the definitions and inputs on masculinity and feminity from the parents (Gagnon & Simon, 1973). Thus, the gender role is a combination of both the biological and the social, rather than a product of one or the other.
It is in the period after infancy, when the child begins to develop language skills, until adulthood that the child begins to undergo very different processes. These processes are extremely culture-bound. It is through these processes that the child begins to organize how s/he will deal with the world. There are two experiences that dominant these years. The first is the naming of the behaviors, and adult reactions to them, specifically the sexual. The second is the continued building of gender identities based on decisions made on the maleness or femaleness of the child by adults (parents, doctors, etc.).
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