Concordance of Paraphilic Interests and Behaviors

• Published in: The Journal of sex research 2021-05, Vol.58 (4), p.424-437
• Main Authors: Seto, Michael C., Curry, Susan, Dawson, Samantha J., Bradford, John M. W., Chivers, Meredith L.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Behavior; Exhibitionism; Frotteurism; Gender; Heterosexuality; Masochism; Moderation; Sadism; Sexual orientation; Women; Zoophilia
• ISSN: 0022-4499; 1559-8519
• DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2020.1830018

We examined the concordance of paraphilic interests and behaviors across 13 themes in an online sample of 1,036 men and women. Paraphilic interests were significantly and positively correlated with behaviors across all 13 themes. Associations were strongest for masochism and sadism, and weakest for pedohebephilia and frotteurism. Paraphilic interest and behavior were significantly and positively correlated after accounting for gender and sexual orientation. Moderated moderation analysis was significant for five themes. Gender was a moderator for eroticized gender, but only among heterosexual participants, where concordance was higher for heterosexual men than for heterosexual women. For both exhibitionism and frotteurism, gender was a significant moderator, but only for nonheterosexual participants, where concordance was stronger for nonheterosexual men than for nonheterosexual women. For pedohebephilia, interest was significantly associated with behavior for heterosexual men, heterosexual women, and nonheterosexual men, but not for nonheterosexual women. For zoophilia, there was a significant association between interest and behavior for heterosexual men, nonheterosexual men, and nonheterosexual women, but not heterosexual women. Additional analyses found sex drive moderated the positive associations of 7 of 13 paraphilic themes, with 5 of these 7 showing the expected effect of higher concordance of interests and behaviors at higher levels of sex drive.