<< Sources of Erotic Arousal >>

The upper level male is aroused by a considerable variety of sexual stimuli. He has a minimum of pre-marital of extra-marital intercourse (Tables 96, 97). The lower level male, on the other hand, is less often aroused by anything except physical contact in coitus; he has an abundance of pre-marital intercourse, and a considerable amount of extra-marital intercourse in the early years of his marriage. How much of this difference is simply the product of psychologic factors and how much represents a community pattern which can be properly identified as the mores, it is difficult to say. The very fact that upper level males fail to get what they want in socio-sexual relations would provide a psychologic explanation of their high degree of erotic responsiveness to stimuli which fall short of actual coitus. The fact that the lower level male comes nearer having as much coitus as he wants (Table 92) would make him less susceptible to any stimulus except actual coitus.

The higher degree of eroticism in the upper level male may also be consequent on his greater capacity to visualize situations which are not immediately at hand. In consequence, he is affected by thinking about females, and/or by seeing females or the homosexual partner, by burlesque shows, obscene stories, love stories in good literature, love stories in moving pictures, animals in coitus, and sado-masochistic literature. Upper level males are the ones who most often read erotic literature, and the ones who most often find erotic stimulation in pictures and other objects. None of these are significant sources of stimulation for most lower level males, who may look on such a thing as the use of pictures or literature to augment masturbatory fantasies as the strangest sort of perversion.

While these group differences may be primarily psychologic in origin, there is clearly an element of tradition involved. Each community more or less accepts the idea that there will be or will not be erotic arousal under particular sorts of circumstances. The college male who continuously talks about girls does so with a certain consciousness that the other persons in his group are also going to be aroused by such conversation, and that they accept such arousal as natural and desirable. The homosexual male, and the heterosexual male who does not approve of such deliberately induced eroticism, considers this public display of elation over females as a group activity which is more or less artificially encouraged. The lower level male who talks about girls quite as frequently, or even more so, is less often aroused by such talk and may be inclined to consider a listener who is so aroused as somewhat aberrant. There is an element of custom involved in these styles of erotic response.

Observing the Opposite Sex
A third (32 per cent) of the males in the sample reported that they were considerably and regularly aroused by observing certain females (clothed or nude), including their wives, girl friends, and other females of the sort with whom they would like to have sexual relations. Another 40 per cent recorded some response. Only half as many of the females (17 per cent) in the sample reported that they were particularly aroused upon observing males, whether they were their husbands, boy friends, or other males, and another 41 per cent recorded some response. The specific data are as follows:

Observing the opposite sex
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	17	32
Some response	41	40
Never	42	28
Number of cases	5772	4226

The responses of these males upon observing females were the physiologic responses characteristic of sexual arousal; they often included genital reactions, and often led the male to approach the female for physical contact. Females who had been aroused with similar intensities did occur in the sample, but most of the females who had been aroused had not responded with such marked physiologic reactions..

Responses upon observing potential sexual partners are also characteristic of the males of most of the infra-human species of mammals, but the females of most of the mammalian species less frequently show signs of erotic arousal before they have made physical contact with the sexual partner. Psychologic arousal in the female occurs most frequently when she is in estrus. Female dogs, female chimpanzees, sometimes cows, female porcupines, and the females of some other species may become quite aroused while they are in estrus and become aggressive in making sexual approaches to the male; although among even these species the females are not aggressive as often as the males.
That aggressive sexual behavior is common among estrual females of infra-human mammalian species, is recorded by: Elliott acc. Miller 1931:382, 405 (fur seal; the male is so busy guarding his harem that the female must take the initiative). Zuckerman 1932:227-229, 243 (baboon). Carpenter 1942:131, 136, 154 (monkey; the female may repeatedly approach the male despite having been driven off and wounded). Yerkes and Elder 1936a:25-26 (chimpanzee; female almost always goes to the male, not the male to the female). Roark and Herman 1950:7 (cows sometimes pursue the bull). McKenzie (verbal communic., says between 10 and 30 per cent of mares may pursue stallions). Carpenter 1942:129 (in gibbon, both sexes are about equally aggressive in pugnacity and reproductive behavior). We have also observed such female aggressiveness in the dog and porcupine.

Observing One’s Own Sex
The recognition of erotic arousal upon observing other individuals of one’s own sex is, of course, a basically homosexual phenomenon. In our culture, with its strong condemnation of male homosexuality, most males who want to think of themselves as completely heterosexual are therefore afraid to admit that they see even esthetic merit in other males. On the other hand, females are allowed to find esthetic satisfactions in observing the nude female form, or in observing well dressed females, and our cultural traditions make it possible for a female to express her admiration of another female without being suspected of homosexual interests. Actually, the female’s interest in other females is often a matter of identification with a person she admires, and lacks any erotic element.

In view of this lesser social acceptance of male interests in males, and of the readier acceptance of female interests in females, it is particularly interesting to find that males recognize and admit their erotic responses to other males as often or even more often than females recognize and admit their erotic responses to other females. The record is as follows:

Observing one’s own sex
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	3	7
Some response	9	9
Never	88	84
Number of cases	5754	4220

Observing Portrayals of Nude Figures
Something more than half (54 per cent) of the males in our sample had been erotically aroused by seeing photographs or drawings or paintings of nude females, just as they were aroused upon observing living females. Most homosexual males are similarly aroused by seeing portrayals of nude males. Fewer (12 per cent) of the females in the sample had ever been aroused by seeing photographs or drawings or paintings of either male or female nudes. The specific record is as follows:

Observing portrayals of nude figures
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	3	18
Some response	9	36
Never	88	46
Number of cases	5698	4191

It is difficult for the average female to comprehend why males are aroused by seeing photographs or portrayals of nudes when they cannot possibly have overt sexual relations with them. Males on the other hand, cannot comprehend why females who have had satisfactory sexual relations should not be aroused by nude portrayals of the same person, or of the sort of person with whom they have had sexual relations. We have histories of males who have attempted to arouse their female partners by showing them nude photographs or drawings, and most of these males could not comprehend that their female partners were not in actuality being aroused by such material. When a male does realize that his wife or girl friend fails to respond to such stimuli, he may conclude that she no longer loves him and is no longer willing to allow herself to respond in his presence. He fails to comprehend that it is a characteristic of females in general, rather than the reaction of the specific female, which is involved in this lack of response.

Striking evidence of the differences in the reactions of females and males is to be found in the commercial distribution of portrayals of nude human figures. There is a tremendous business of this sort, including the sale of good nude art, of photographic prints, and of moving picture, physical culture, and nudist magazines. There are nude or near nude figures in the main pages and in the advertising sections of nearly all illustrated magazines. Much of this material is distributed without any deliberate intent to provide erotic stimulation, and much of it has artistic and other serious value; but all of it may provide erotic stimulation for many of the male consumers.
A survey and discussion of the popularity of near nudity in magazines and in advertising is in: A. Ellis 1951:104-107. He recognizes that females are not aroused by portrayals of male nudity, but explains it on the basis of the lack of taboo. For other recognition of the lack of female arousal from erotic pictures, see: Brettschneider in Wulffen et al. 1931:106. Wallace 1948:22. Friedeburg 1950:24 (47 per cent males, 11 per cent females erotically aroused by photographs or pictures in German survey).

Photographs of female nudes and magazines exhibiting nude or near nude females are produced primarily for the consumption of males. There are, however, photographs and magazines portraying nude and near nude males — but these are also produced for the consumption of males. There are almost no male or female nudes which are produced for the consumption of females. The failure of nearly all females to find erotic arousal in such portrayals is so well known to the distributors of nude photographs and nude magazines that they have considered that it would not be financially profitable to produce such material for a primarily female audience.

Erotic Fine Art
There may be a diversity of erotic elements in art, but the most obvious is the portrayal of the human body or portions of the human body in a fashion which gives evidence of the artist’s erotic interest in his or her subject matter, or provides erotic stimulation for the individual observing the work.
Freud 1922:78-79 in his study of Leonardo da Vinci recognized this in the following words: “A kindly nature has bestowed upon the artist the capacity to express in artistic productions his most secret psychic feelings hidden even to himself, which powerfully affect outsiders who are strangers to the artist.”

An extensive study which we are making of the erotic element in art indicates that a very high proportion of the male artists who portray the human form, either female or male, do so in a fashion which indicates an erotic interest in that form. Even though there may be no portrayal of genitalia and no suggestion of sexual action, the nude body itself may be drawn or painted in a fashion which is erotic to the artist and to most males who subsequently observe the drawing or painting. Such artists as Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael in his drawings, Rubens, Rodin, Renoir, and Maillol — to cite a few specific cases — rarely drew nudes which, in the judgment of the qualified artists whom we have consulted, did not show such an erotic element.

It is, of course, possible to portray the nude form, as was regularly done in Egyptian art, for instance, in a way which is not erotic; but among the males who have drawn or painted nude figures, it is rare to find any in European or American art who have done so without evident erotic interest. We have not found more than a half dozen male artists of moment who have regularly drawn nudes which have not shown an erotic content.

While the number of female artists has been much less than the number of males who have done painting or drawing, there are many hundreds of them in the history of European and American art. But in some years of searching, we have been able to find only eight instances of important female artists who have drawn the human figure in a fashion which qualified artists, female or male, judge to be erotic. In conjunction with the data which indicate that relatively few females are aroused upon observing nude paintings or drawings, it is understandable that female artists themselves should not be erotically responsive to the nude subjects which they are drawing or painting; and this is evident in their finished work.
For encyclopedic lists of artists, the standard works are: Thieme and Becker 1907-1947, 35 v. Mallett 1935; 1940. Bénézit 1948-1952, 5 v. For a convenient anthology, see: Sparrow 1905, Women painters of the world. Bulliet in McDermott and Taft 1932:233-252 lists 40 artists, all of whom are male, known for their female nudes. Havelock Ellis 1929:376-378 (cites Ferrero who explains the small part played by women in art as due to their less keen sexual emotions. Ellis, however, interprets male power of creation in fine arts as compensation for the male's lesser role in producing and moulding the race). Wallace 1948:21 recognizes that female painters and sculptors do not use nude subjects as frequently as male artists.

It is to be noted that seven out of the eight female artists whose work seems erotic had confined themselves to portraying the nude female form.

Observing Commercial Moving Pictures
Portrayals of more or less erotic situations are so common in present-day commercial moving pictures that their significance as sources of erotic arousal, for either females or males, is probably less than it was in an earlier day and certainly much less than most official and unofficial censors would believe. It is not impossible that many males would more often respond erotically to love scenes, to close-ups of petting and kissing, and to exhibitionistic displays of semi-nude bodies if they were to observe such pictures in the privacy of their homes or in conjunction with some sexual partner. In the average public theatre, however, the openly expressed reactions of the audience suggest that they are more amused than aroused by the sort of eroticism which is usually presented. However, their vocal responses, cat calls, and whistling may indicate that they are reacting emotionally and trying to deny it by way of a contrary response.

The males and females in our sample recorded their reactions to commercial moving pictures as follows:

Observing Commercial Moving Pictures
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	9	6
Some response	39	30
Never	52	64
Number of cases	5411	3231

This means that the females found the moving pictures erotically stimulating somewhat more often than the males. This is one of the few sources of psychologic stimulation which seem to have been more significant for the females in the sample.

Some of the stimulation provided by a moving picture may depend on the romantic action which it portrays, and some of it may depend on the portrayal of some particular person. In a larger number of instances, the erotic stimulation may depend on the emotional atmosphere created by the picture as a whole, just as viewing a landscape, reading a book, or sitting with another person before an open fire may lead to emotional responses which then become erotic. Sometimes the erotic element in the picture may have no obvious sexual meaning except to the individual who has been conditioned by the particular element. Sometimes the erotic arousal may depend upon the presence of the companion with whom one is attending the performance.

Observing Burlesque and Floor Shows
Burlesque shows more or less openly attempt to provide erotic stimulation for the attending audience, and a considerable proportion of those who go to such shows do so with the anticipation that they are going to be aroused erotically. More skilled versions of the burlesque routines are the chief elements of the average night club’s floor show.

Most males are aroused by the advertisements at the entrance to a burlesque show, and considerably aroused by anticipating what they are going to see. Most of the males (62 per cent) in our sample had been aroused by the show itself upon their first visit or two, but most of them had not found the shows particularly stimulating after that. Since some of these males had continued to attend such shows, it may be that they did receive some generalized erotic satisfaction from them even though it was not as specific as on the first occasion. Some of them may have gone because they were attracted by the humorous elements in such performances; but in many instances they continued to go because they hoped that they would again be stimulated as they had been on their first few visits.

The erotic reactions of those females and males in our sample who had ever seen a burlesque or night club floor show were reported as follows:

Observing burlesque and floor shows
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	4	28
Some response	10	34
Never	86	38
Number of cases	2550	3377

A decade or two ago the burlesque audiences were almost exclusively male; today the audiences may include a more equal number of females and males. It is difficult, however, to explain this attendance by females in view of the fact that so few of them (14 per cent in our sample) are aroused erotically by such shows. Apparently most females attend burlesque shows because they are social functions about which they are curious, and which they may share with their male companions. They may find some pleasure in the humorous elements in such a show. Only a very few of them are seeking homosexual stimulation from observing the females in the show.

Observing Sexual Action
A considerable proportion of those males in our sample who had had the opportunity to observe other persons in sexual activity had responded sympathetically during their observation. The females in the sample who had had the opportunity to observe sexual activity rarely reported such sympathetic responses. Most of them had been indifferent in their responses, if they had not been offended by the social impropriety of such an exhibition.

It is, therefore, no accident, and not merely the product of the cultural tradition, that commercialized exhibitions of sexual activity, since the days of ancient Rome, have been provided for male but almost never for female audiences. There are many males who would not accept an opportunity to attend such exhibitions because they consider them morally objectionable, but even they usually recognize that they would be aroused if they were to observe them.

There is an inclination to explain these differences in the responses of females and of males as products of the cultural tradition, and there is a widespread opinion that females are more inclined to accept the social proprieties because they are basically more moral than males. On the other hand, the same sorts of differences between the sympathetic responses of females and of males may be observed in other species of mammals. The males of practically all infra-human species may become aroused when they observe other animals in sexual activity. 16 Of this fact farmers, animal breeders, scientists experimenting with laboratory animals, and many persons who have kept household pets are abundantly aware. The females of the infra-human species less often show such sympathetic responses when they observe other animals in sexual activity. These data suggest that human females are more often inclined to accept the social proprieties because they are stimulated psychologically and respond sympathetically less often than most males do.
The sight of coitus between animals of the same species arouses such diverse animals as the bull (our observation, and McKenzie, verbal communic.), and chimpanzee (Nissen, verbal communic.). Zitrin and Beach in Hartman 1945:43-44 report that male cats become aroused by seeing female cats reacting to being masturbated by a human experimenter.

Observing Portrayals of Sexual Action
In spite of state and federal laws, and in spite of the considerable effort which law enforcement officers periodically make to prevent the distribution of photographs, drawings, moving pictures, and other portrayals of sexual action, such materials exist in considerable abundance in this country and probably in greater abundance in most other countries. Graphic portrayals of sexual action have existed in most cultures, throughout history. This is a measure of the considerable significance which such materials may have for the consuming public which, however, is largely male.

Practically all of the males in the sample had had the opportunity to observe portrayals of sexual action, and had taken the opportunity to observe them. Most of the males (77 per cent) who had seen such material indicated that they had been aroused erotically by seeing it. A smaller proportion of the females in the sample had had the opportunity to see, or had taken the opportunity to see such portrayals of sexual action. Only a third of them (32 per cent) had found any erotic arousal in observing such material. The specific record is as follows:

Observing portrayals of sexual action
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	14	42
Some response	18	35
Never	68	23
Number of cases	2242	3868

Many females, of course, report that they are offended by portrayals of sexual action, and denounce them on moral, social, and aesthetic grounds. This is ordinarily taken as evidence of the female’s greater sense of propriety; but in the light of our other data on the relative significance of psychologic stimulation for females and for males, it seems more likely that most females are indifferent or antagonistic to the existence of such material because it means nothing to them erotically.
Clark and Treichler 1950 report an increase in acid phosphatase (an enzyme found in the urine) in four males aroused by erotic pictures, a decrease in a male who was repelled by them, and no change in two females who saw the pictures.

Most males find it difficult to comprehend why females are not aroused by such graphic representations of sexual action, and not infrequently males essay to show such materials to their wives or other female partners, thinking thereby to arouse them prior to their sexual contacts.
This masculine misconception is not new. Brantome (16th century, ‘‘Lives of Fair and Gallant Ladies,” First Discourse, ch. 5 (1901:55), tells of a prince who served wine to women in a cup covered with copulatory figures. He would then ask, “Now feel ye not a something that doth prick you in the mid part of the body, ladies, at the sight?” and the women would reply, “Nay!, never a one of all these droll images hath had power enow to stir me!”

The wives, on the other hand, are often at a loss to understand why a male who is having satisfactory sexual relations at home should seek additional stimulation in portrayals of sexual action. They are hurt to find that their husbands desire any stimulation in addition to what they, the wives, can provide, and not a few of the wives think of it as a kind of infidelity which offends them. We have seen considerable disturbance in some of the married histories because of such disagreements over the husband’s use of erotic objects, and there are cases of wives who instituted divorce proceedings because they had discovered that their husbands possessed photographs or drawings of sexual action.

Local drives against so-called obscene materials, and state, federal, and international moves against the distribution of such materials, are not infrequently instituted by females who not only find the material morally and socially objectionable, but probably fail to comprehend the significance that it may have for most males and for some females.

Observing Animals in Coitus
Many human males and some females respond sympathetically upon observing animals of other species in coitus. The specific data show that 32 per cent of the males in our sample had so responded. Watching dogs or cattle in coitus had been the inspiration for the involvement of some of the farm boys in sexual relationships with the animals themselves. There were some females but fewer (16 per cent) who were aroused by observing the sexual activities of other animals. The data are as follows:

Observing animals in coitus
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	5	11
Some response	11	21
Never	84	68
Number of cases	5250	4082

Peeping and Voyeurism
There are probably very few heterosexual males who would not take advantage of the opportunity to observe a nude female, or to observe heterosexual activity, particularly if it were possible to do so surreptitiously so they would not suffer the social disgrace that the discovery of their behavior might bring. To many males, the observation of a female who is undressing may be erotically more stimulating than observing her when she is fully nude, for the undressing suggests, in fantasy, what they may ultimately be able to observe. Consequently, we have the peeper who gets into difficulty with the law, the peep show which was formerly common in this country and which is still available in many other countries, and the more surreptitious and unpublicized peeping in which most males engage, at some time in their lives, from the windows of their homes, from hotel windows, and from wherever they find the opportunity to observe. Our data are insufficient for determining what percentage of the male population is ever involved, but Hamilton found some 65 per cent of the males in his study admitting that they had done some peeping. 19 The percentages for the population as a whole are probably higher.
Hamilton 1929:456 found 16 per cent of females and 83 per cent of males had had desire to peep as adults; 20 per cent of females and 65 per cent of males had done actual peeping.

The erotic significance of what the peeper observes obviously depends on his capacity to be stimulated psychologically. But there are few instances in our own study, or in other studies, or in the medical and psychiatric literature, of females as peepers. Out of curiosity some females are undoubtedly sometimes involved, and a few of them may find erotic stimulation in such peeping; but such behavior is certainly rare among females.

Stimulation by Literary Materials
Erotic responses while reading novels, essays, poetry, or other literary materials may depend upon the general emotional content of the work, upon specifically romantic material in it, upon its sexual vocabulary (particularly if it is a vernacular vocabulary), or upon its more specific descriptions of sexual activity. The reader may thus, vicariously, share the experience of the characters portrayed in the book, and reactions to such literary material are some measure of the reader s capacity to be aroused psychologically.

The reactions of the females and males in our sample were as follows:

Reading literary materials
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	16	21
Some response	44	38
Never	40	41
Number of cases	5699	3952

It will be noted that the females and males in the sample had responded erotically in nearly the same numbers while reading literary materials. Twice as many of the females in the sample had responded to literary materials as had ever responded to the observation of portrayals of sexual action, and five times as many as had responded to photographs or other portrayals of nude human figures. At this point we do not clearly understand why this should be so. There are possible psychoanalytic interpretations, but in view of all the evidence that there may be basic neurophysiologic differences between females and males, we hesitate to offer any explanation of the present data.
That the erotic stimulation which females derive from reading romantic stories or seeing moving pictures equals or exceeds that which is derived from those sources by males, is also recognized by: Friedeburg 1950:24. See also Dickinson and Beam 1934:111, 427.

Stimulation by Erotic Stories
Practically all of the males in the sample, even including the youngest adolescent boys, had heard stories that were deliberately intended to be erotically stimulating, usually through their descriptions of sexual action. Nearly half (47 per cent) of the males in the sample reported that they had been aroused, at least on occasion, by such stories. There had been differences in the responses among males of the various educational levels. Most of the better educated males had responded, while fewer of the males of the lower educational levels were aroused by such stimuli. Some 53 per cent of the males in the total sample said that they had never been aroused by such stories.

Some 95 per cent of the females in the sample had heard or read stories that were deliberately intended to bring erotic response, but only 14 per cent recalled that they had ever been aroused by such stories. The specific record is as follows:

Stimulation by erotic stories
Erotic Response	by Females	by Males
	%	%
Definite and/or frequent	2	16
Some response	12	31
Never	86	53
Number of cases	5523	4202

Note that some 86 per cent of the females who had heard obscene stories had never received any erotic arousal from them. Some of the females had been offended by the stories, and it is not impossible that their failure to be aroused represented a perverse attitude which they had developed in consequence of the general opinion that such stories are indecent and immoral. On the other hand, a surprising proportion of the females in the sample indicated that they enjoyed such stories, usually because of their intrinsic humor. Sometimes their interest in the stories represented a defiance of the social convention. There is some indication, although we do not have the data to establish it, that there is an increasing acceptance of such stories among females in this country today. The older tradition which restricted the telling of such stories in the presence of a female has largely broken down within the last decade or two, and since there is this freer acceptance of such stories by many females, it is all the more surprising to find how few ever find erotic stimulation in them.

Erotic Writing and Drawing
What is commonly identified as pornography is literature or drawing which has the erotic arousal of the reader or observer as its deliberate and primary or sole objective. Erotic elements may be involved in the production of other literary material and in the fine arts; but in the opinion of most students, and in various court decisions, such literary and fine art materials are distinguished by the fact that they have literary or artistic merit as their prime objective, and depend only secondarily on erotic elements to accomplish those ends.
For examples of court decisions holding that despite certain obscene or indecent passages the books themselves were not obscene; see: In re Worthington Co. 1894:30 N.Y. Supp. 361. Halsey v. N.Y.Soc. for the Suppression of Vice 1922:136 N.E.(N.Y.) 219 (“It contains many paragraphs, however, which taken by themselves are undoubtedly vulgar and indecent. . . . Printed by themselves they might, as a matter of law, come within the prohibition of the statute. So might a similar selection from Aristophanes or Chaucer or Boccaccio or even from the Bible. The book, however, must be considered broadly as a whole”). U.S. v. One Book Entitled Ulysses 1934:72F(2d)705. Com. V. Gordon 1949:66 D. and C. (Pa.) 101 (Judge Bok's scholarly discussion of the changing concepts of obscenity, citing our male volume on 116). But cf. Com. V. Isenstadt 1945:62 N.E.2d (Mass.)840. Detailed discussions are found in: Alpert 1938, and Jenkins 1944.

In every modern language, the amount of deliberately pornographic material that has been produced is beyond ready calculation. Some thousands of such documents have been printed in European languages alone, and the literature of the Orient and other parts of the world is replete with such material. Similarly, there is an unlimited amount of pornographic drawing and painting which has been produced by artists of some ability in every part of the world, and there is no end to the amateur portrayals of sexual action.

But in all this quantity of pornographic production, it is exceedingly difficult to find any material that has been produced by females. In the published material, there are probably not more than two or three documents that were actually written by females. It is true that there is a considerable portion of the pornographic material which pretends to be written by females who are recounting their personal experience, but in many instances it is known that the authors were male, and in nearly every instance the internal content of the material indicates a male author. A great deal of the pornographic literature turns around detailed descriptions of genital activity, and descriptions of male genital performance. These are elements in which females, according to our data, are not ordinarily interested. The females in such literature extol the male’s genital and copulatory capacity, and there is considerable emphasis on the intensity of the female’s response and the insatiability of her sexual desires. All of these represent the kind of female which most males wish all females to be. They represent typically masculine misinterpretations of the average female’s capacity to respond to psychologic stimuli. Such elements are introduced because they are of erotic significance to the male writers, and because they are of erotic significance to the consuming public, which is almost exclusively male.

Among the hundreds and probably thousands of unpublished, amateur documents which we have seen during the past fifteen years, we have been able to find only three manuscripts written by females which contain erotic elements of the sort ordinarily found in documents written by males. Similarly, out of the thousands of erotic drawings which we have seen, some of them by artists of note and some of them by lesser artists and amateurs, we have been able to find less than a half dozen series done by females.

Females produce another, more extensive literature which is called erotic, and do drawings which are called erotic; but most of these deal with more general emotional situations, affectional relationships, and love. These things do not bring specifically erotic responses from males, and we cannot discover that they bring more than minimal responses from females.

Wall Inscriptions
Making inscriptions (graffiti — literally, writings) of various sorts on walls of buildings, walls lining country lanes, walls in public toilets, and walls in still other public places, is a custom of long and ancient standing. Among the inscriptions made by males, an exceedingly high proportion is sexual and obviously intended to provide erotic stimulation for the inscribers as well as for the persons who may subsequently observe them.

Relatively few females, on the contrary, ever make wall inscriptions. When they do, fewer of the inscriptions are sexual, and only a small proportion of the sexual material seems to be intended to provide erotic stimulation for the inscribers or for the persons who observe the inscriptions.
That other collections of graffiti clearly reflect this scarcity of female authors of such material, can be seen by surveying the articles on graffiti in Anthropophyteia 1907(4) ;316-328; 1908(5) :265-275; 1909(6) :432-439; 1910(7): 399-406; 1912(9):493-500.

With the collaboration of a number of other persons, we have accumulated some hundreds of wall inscriptions from public toilets, making sure that the record in each case covered all of the inscriptions, sexual or non-sexual, heterosexual or homosexual, which were on the walls in the place. The record is as follows:

Incidences of sexual inscriptions
	Females	Males
	%	%
Places with any sexual inscription	50	58
% of inscriptions which were erotic	25	86
Number of places surveyed	94	259
Number of sexual inscriptions	331	1048

A high proportion (86 per cent) of the inscriptions on the walls of the male toilets were sexual. The sexual materials were drawings, lone words, phrases, and sometimes more extended writing. There were three chief subjects in these inscriptions: genitalia (either female or male), genital, oral, or anal action (either heterosexual or homosexual), and vernacular vocabularies which, by association, are erotically significant for most males.

On the contrary, not more than 25 per cent of the toilet wall inscriptions made by the females dealt with any of these matters. Most of the female inscriptions referred to love, or associated names (“John and Mary,” “Helen and Don”), or were lipstick impressions, or drawings of hearts; but very few of them were genital or dealt with genital action or sexual vernaculars. A brief summary of the material which we have accumulated shows the following:

Subject of Inscriptions	Made by Females	Made by Males
	%	%
Heterosexual	17	21
Genitalia of opposite sex	5	3
Coital contacts	7	8
Oral contacts	2	11
Anal contacts	1	–
Other erotic items	2	3
References to dating	0	5
Homosexual	11	75
Genitalia of own sex	7	15
Oral contacts	1	30
Anal contacts	0	18
Other erotic items	2	8
References to dating	1	21
Erotic, not classifiable as heterosexual or homosexual	5	6
Non-erotic references to love
With own sex	12	3
With opposite sex	35	3
Sex not specified	9	0
Hearts	6	0
Lips	69	0
Number of inscriptions	331	1048

Again it will be suggested that females are less inclined to make wall inscriptions of any sort, and less inclined to make erotic wall inscriptions, because of their greater regard for the moral codes and the social conventions. In view of our data showing that most females are not erotically aroused by the psychologic stimuli that are of significance to the male, and in view of the data showing that most females are not erotically aroused by observing sexual action, by portrayals of sexual action, or by fantasies about sexual action, there seems little doubt that the average female’s lack of interest in making wall inscriptions must depend primarily upon the fact that they mean little or nothing to her erotically. The male usually derives erotic satisfaction from making them, and he may derive even greater satisfaction in anticipating that, the inscriptions he makes will arouse other males, amounting sometimes to hundreds and thousands of other males who may subsequently see them.

It is notable that the wall inscriptions in male toilets are concerned with male genitalia and male functions more often than they are concerned with female genitalia or functions. This, at first glance, makes them appear homosexual, but we are not yet ready to accept this interpretation. It is possible that homosexual males are actually more inclined, while heterosexual males are less inclined to make wall inscriptions. It is possible that homosexual males are more inclined because they may be more aroused in making such inscriptions, and because they anticipate how other males will react upon seeing them. The heterosexual male has no such incentive, since he knows that no females will see his writing. But we are inclined to believe that many of the inscriptions that deal with male anatomy and male function are made by males who are not conscious of homosexual reactions and who may not have had overt homosexual experience, but who, nevertheless, may be interested in male anatomy and male functions as elements which enter into heterosexual activities.

But whatever the conscious intent of the inscriber, the wall inscriptions provide information on the extent and the nature of the suppressed sexual desires of females and males. The inscriptions most frequently deal with activities which occur less frequently in the actual histories. This means that the males who make the inscriptions, and the males who read them, are exposing their unsatisfied desires. The inscriptions portray what they would like to experience in real life. Usually the inscriptions are anonymous. They are usually located in restricted, hidden, or remote places. Most of the males who make them would not so openly express their erotic interests in places where they could be identified.

Comparisons of the female and male inscriptions epitomize, therefore, some of the most basic sexual differences between females and males.



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