<< Significance of Petting >>

Petting is not confined to adult human animals. Similar non-coital contacts occur among mammals and among children of the human species where such activity is usually identified as sex play. While the specific activities involved in such play may be quite the same as those which are characterized as petting when they occur among adults, the adult human behavior differs in its more conscious pursuit of erotic satisfactions.

Throughout the animal kingdom, and to some extent in the plant kingdom as well, it is normal for an organism to respond to physical contact by pressing against the stimulating object. Unless high temperatures are involved, or pain is adduced by some other quality of the situation, pressure by an object normally leads the animal or some part of its body to move toward that object. The human babe so responds from the time of birth, and it soon learns that such responses are rewarded by the warmth of a contact with another human body, by additional satisfaction which it may receive from the petting and cuddling which its mother or others may give it, sometimes by food, and sometimes by protection from unpleasant situations. These early contacts bring such arousal as would be called erotic in an adult, and which are undoubtedly so in the younger animal (Chapter 5).

Among most species of mammals there is, in actuality, a great deal of sex play which never leads to coitus. Most mammals, when sexually aroused, crowd together and nuzzle and explore with their noses, mouths, and feet over each other s bodies. They make lip-to-lip contacts and tongue-to-tongue contacts, and use their mouths to manipulate every part of the companion s body, including the genitalia. They may nip, bite, scratch, groom, pull at the fur of the other animal, pull out fur, urinate, and repeatedly mount without, however, making any serious attempt to effect a genital union. Such activity may continue for a matter of minutes, or hours, or even in some cases for days before there is any attempt at coitus. The student of mammalian mating behavior, interested in observing coitus in his animal stocks, sometimes may have to wait through hours and days of sex play before he has an opportunity to observe actual coitus, if, indeed, the animals do not finally separate without ever attempting a genital union.
Significant studies and bibliographies on non-coital sex play among infra-human mammals include the following: Bolsche 1926(2): 177. Jenkins in Warden 1931 (58 out of 79 rats pursued and licked females but failed to copulate). Zuckerman 1932:237. Young 1941 (an excellent survey and bibliography). Shadle, Smelzer, and Metz 1946 (porcupine). Reed 1946. Beach in Hoch and Zubin 1949. Hafez 1951. Ford and Beach 1951:42, 58, 66, et passim. We are indebted especially to Frank Beach, Robert Bean, director of The Brookfield Zoo in Chicago, Robert Enders, Karl Lashley, Fred McKenzie, Henry Nissen, Albert Shadle, William Young, and a number of other students of mammalian sexual behavior for many of these data. Much of the material presented here is based on our study of the several thousand feet of moving picture film which we have made or acquired from other laboratories. Our own observations on non-coital sex play cover the baboon, chimpanzee, monkey, dog, chinchilla, hamster, rat, guinea pig, rabbit, porcupine, raccoon, cat, mare, cow, sheep, sow, and skunk.

Extensive sex play has been observed in such widely diverse mammals as cattle, horses, hogs, sheep, cats, lions, dogs, raccoon, rats, mice, guinea pigs, chinchillas, hamsters, porcupines, rabbits, mink, sable, ferrets, skunks, otter, monkeys, chimpanzees, and still other species. A wide variety of petting techniques is employed by many of these. There are few situations or techniques in human petting behavior which are not widespread among the other mammals.

Some individuals among the infra-human species may proceed quite directly to coitus whenever they find an acceptant partner. Other individuals may be more inclined to prolong their pre-coital activities. Some individuals rarely arrive at coitus at all, even though they may engage in a great deal of non-coital play. In these respects, all of the variations in human petting behavior are matched by similar variations among the lower mammals.

Just as in the human animal, and even more often than in the human animal, petting among the other mammals is primarily, although not exclusively, male activity which is directed toward the female. As in the human species, it is the male which is more likely to be aroused psychologically and usually before he makes any physical contact. It is the male among most of the mammals which does most of the crowding, exploring, nipping, and biting, and which initiates most of the mouth-genital contacts.

Just as in the human species, it is the male among practically all of the mammals which initiates the ultimate genital union. Most of the females, however, reciprocate if they are in estrus or heat, i.e., at that state in the reproductive cycle when they are most responsive sexually, and the females of some species may then initiate petting and coital activities, and may even become quite aggressive, just as among some human females.

Just as in the human male, the non-coital sex play among other mammals may sometimes lead to ejaculation before coitus has been effected or even attempted; but there is no clear-cut evidence that the infrahuman female ever reaches orgasm in her non-coital sexual activities.

The anatomy of the human animal, particularly his hands, may allow him to utilize a wider variety of techniques than most other mammals can use, and the human activity may be more consciously planned, deliberately elaborated, and expertly prolonged. But it is obvious that the human animal behaves like the mammal which it is when it engages in petting before it begins coitus.

The wide distribution of non-coital sex play among all of the mammalian species on which there are sufficient data is evidence of the ancient origins of the anatomic and physiologic bases of such behavior some millions of years ago in the ancestral stocks of the class Mammalia. Indeed, some of the basic capacities on which petting behavior depends must have originated hundreds of millions of years ago among the ancient vertebrate stocks which gave rise to the Mammalia; for sensory satisfactions obtained from the crowding together of animal bodies, from tongue-to-tongue contacts, and from mouth contacts with other parts of the partner s body, are also evident in the behavior of some of the other vertebrates, including the lizards, still other reptiles, and the birds. In a biologic sense, petting is a normal or natural sort of behavior, and not the intellectually contrived perversion which it has sometimes been considered. In a biologic sense, the real perversion is the inhibition and suppression of such activities on the supposition that they represent "acts contrary to nature.”

Many persons who are ignorant of the ancient mammalian origins of the phenomenon consider petting an invention of modern American youth—the product of an effete and morally degenerate, over-industrialized and over-educated, urban culture. It is taken by some to reflect the sort of moral bankruptcy which must lead to the collapse of any civilization.
As examples of petting interpreted as moral bankruptcy, see: Hoyer 1929:64 (The demi-vierge represents the acme of sexual demoralization. She knows all shades of sex pleasure without having lost her virginity). Englisch 1931: 431 (The demi-vierge is vicious in body and soul). Lowry 1938:53-57 (the first kiss leads to intercourse and subsequent downfall. ‘If the young women of America only knew how lightly they are esteemed by those who so passionately seek their favors in this manner [i.e., petting], they would certainly resist them if the effort cost them their lives”).

Older generations did, however, engage in flirting, flirtage, courting, bundling, spooning, mugging, smooching, larking, sparking, and other activities which were simply petting under another name. The ancient origins of the extensive vocabulary by which the various techniques of petting have been designated provide some evidence that a considerable amount of such activity occurred in previous centuries of human history. A more specific record is supplied by the descriptive literature on human sexual relations. From the earliest art and writings in Sanskrit, Chinese, and Japanese literature, down through Greek and Roman history, and on through the earlier Arabic and European literature dealing with love and courting, all of the petting techniques known to modern generations are explicitly described. The Mochican pottery of ancient Peru, which dates somewhere between 700 B.C. and 300 A.D., depicts practically every petting and coital technique known to modern youth. The condemnation in Judeo-Christian and other religious codes of sexual activities which are not coital or which do not serve as a preliminary to coitus, is sufficient evidence that there was petting behavior to be condemned when the codes were first originated.

Travelers’ tales and anthropologists’ reports on the customs of more primitive, pre-literate cultures provide a similar record of the worldwide occurrence of petting behavior. For one or another primitive group, the records include every conceivable form of non-coital sexual manipulation and contact. The independent but parallel development of such similar patterns in these widely scattered races is, again, further evidence of their phylogenetic origins in anatomic and physiologic characteristics which must have been part of the heritage of the ancient ancestors of all mankind.

Throughout the first years of its life, most parents provide a considerable amount of stimulation for the child, and aid and abet the development of its emotional responses. To love a babe and to teach it to love in return is an accepted part of the mores. But as the child grows still older, most parents in our English-American culture begin to restrain its physical contacts, whether with themselves or with other persons. The small girl is taught that she should not allow contacts if they come from persons who are not relatives and, in particular, that she should avoid contacts with males. The boy learns that he is not supposed to touch girls, at least “until he gets older.” Any show of affection is deliberately controlled, and the growing boy is taught not to expect mothering or much sympathy when he faces difficult situations. As some of the psychiatrists (e.g., English and Pearson 1945) have pointed out, the child is brought into a world that is filled with affection and physical love; but as it grows up it is taught to resist its biologically normal responses and to pull away when it is touched by any other person. After fifteen or twenty years of such training, a marriage ceremony is supposed to correct all of the negative responses which have been drilled into the boy or girl, and in their marital relations they are supposed to become as natural and unrestrained as when they were babes. This, of course, is just too much to expect, and it is not surprising that a considerable portion of the best drilled persons in the population (males and females of the college level) is awkward and ineffective in developing affectional relations after marriage.

Such solitary activities as masturbation and nocturnal sex dreams, even though they may be accompanied by fantasies about other persons, depend primarily on an individual’s own interests and capacities to respond sexually. On the other hand, such socio-sexual activities as petting, heterosexual coitus, and homosexual relations must depend upon some confluence of the capacities, interests, and desires of two individuals, and on the willingness of each to adjust to the other. The incidences and frequencies of such activities often represent, therefore, some compromise between an upper limit beyond which the less responsive partner will not agree to go, and a lower limit below which the more responsive partner will not allow the frequencies to drop if there is to be any continuance of the relationship. The incidences and frequencies of socio-sexual activities consequently do not provide a good measure of the sexual capacities of either the female or the male, although they may provide some measure of the willingness and ability of each to adjust to the other.

In most heterosexual relations, it is the male who is most interested in having more frequent contacts, and it is he, therefore, who establishes the minimal rates. Contrariwise, it is the female who is most likely to establish the upper limits beyond which she will not go; but occasionally the female is the more interested partner.

The female is, on the average, slower in developing sexually, and less responsive than the male. She is, in consequence, more easily affected by this training in the niceties of restraint. It is, therefore, not surprising to find sexually unresponsive wives in a startlingly high proportion of the marriages, especially in the better educated segments of the population.

Within recent years, younger generations have come to realize something of the significance of pre-marital restraint. Although there is, of course, no doubt that many of the boys and girls who engage in petting do so for the sake of the immediate satisfaction to be obtained, a surprising number of them have consciously considered the relation of such experience to their subsequent marital adjustments. Their understanding of the situation has been helped by the numerous marriage manuals that have been published within the last twenty years, and by courses in psychology, home economics, marriage, and child development, and in other fields of the social sciences. This explains, at least in part, why this younger generation has been more or less oblivious to the not inconsiderable criticisms made by older persons about its petting behavior (Jefferis and Nichols 1912, Forbush 1919, Liederman 1926, Meyer 1927, 1929, 1934, 1935, Eddy 1928a, 1928b, Elliott and Bone 1929, Kirsch 1930, Weatherhead 1932, Edson 1936, Bruckner 1937, Dickerson 1937, Clarke 1938, A Catholic Woman Doctor 1939, Kirkendall 1940, Kelly 1941, Bowman 1942, Moffett 1942, Morgan 1943, Moore 1943, Popenoe 1943, Sadler and Sadler 1944, Fleege 1945, Griffin 1945, 1946, Davis 1946, Rice 1946, Boys Club Amer. 1946, Tanner 1946, A Redemptorist Father 1946, H. Frank 1946, R. Frank 1946, McGill 1946a, 1946b, Gartland 1946).

It is amazing to observe the mixture of scientifically supported logic, and of utter illogic, which shapes the petting behavior of most of these youths. That some of them are in some psychic conflict over their activities is evidenced by the curious rationalizations which they use to satisfy their consciences. They are particularly concerned with the avoidance of genital union. The fact that petting involves erotic contacts which are as effective as genital union, and that it may even involve contacts which have been more taboo than genital union, including some that have been considered perversions, does not disturb the youth so much as actual intercourse would. By petting, they preserve their virginities, even though they may achieve orgasm while doing so. They still value virginity, much as the previous generations valued it. Only the list of most other activities has had new values placed on it.

The younger generation considers that its type of behavior is more natural than the restrained courting of the Victorian generations. It sees logic in the Freudian interpretations of the outcome of such restraint on the total personality of an individual. And it is impressed by the evidence which marriage counselors and psychiatrists have that the long periods of premarital restraint are the source of some of the difficulties which many persons find in making sexual adjustments in marriage.

While our data on the sexual factor in marital adjustment must be presented in a later volume, it may now be stated that there are always many factors which are involved in the success or failure of a marriage. It is usually difficult to understand which factors came first in the chain of events, and the persons immediately concerned in any discord are often the ones least capable of understanding the sources of the difficulties in which they find themselves. Sexual adjustments are not the only problems involved in marriage, and often they are not even the most important factors in marital adjustments. A preliminary examination of the six thousand marital histories in the present study, and of nearly three thousand divorce histories, suggests that there may be nothing more important in a marriage than a determination that it shall persist. With such a determination, individuals force themselves to adjust and to accept situations which would seem sufficient grounds for a break-up, if the continuation of the marriage were not the prime objective.

Nevertheless, sexual maladjustments contribute in perhaps three-quarters of the upper level marriages that end in separation or divorce, and in some smaller percentage of the lower level marriages that break up. Where the sexual adjustments are poor, marriages are maintained with difficulty. It takes a considerable amount of idealism and determination to keep a marriage together when the sexual adjustments are not right. Sexual factors are, in consequence, very important in a marriage.

Specifically, the sexual factors which most often cause difficulty in the upper level marriages are (1) the failure of the male to show skill in sexual approach and technique, and (2) the failure of the female to participate with the abandon which is necessary for the successful consummation of any sexual relation. Both of these difficulties stem from the same source, namely, the restraints which are developed in pre-marital years, and the impossibility of freely releasing those restraints after marriage. On this point Freud, the psychoanalysts, and the psychiatrists in general are largely agreed. On this point, our own data provide abundant evidence. The details of the several thousand marital histories that substantiate this conclusion must be given later, but the matter needs to be brought up at this time because of its bearing on the significance of pre-marital petting.

The male’s difficulties in his sexual relations after marriage include a lack of facility, of ease, or of suavity in establishing rapport in a sexual situation. Marriage manuals are mistaken in considering that the masculine failure lies in an insufficient knowledge of techniques. Details of techniques come spontaneously enough when the male is at ease in his own mind about the propriety of his sexual behavior. But as an educated youth he has acquired ideas concerning esthetic acceptability, about the scientific interpretations of actions as clean or hygienic, about techniques that should be effective, mechanically, when he has intercourse. He has decided that there are sexual activities which are right and sexual activities which are wrong, or at least indecent—perhaps abnormal and perverted. Even though these things may not be consciously considered at the moment of intercourse, they are part of the subconscious which controls his performance. Few males achieve any real freedom in their sexual relations even with their wives. Few males realize how badly inhibited they are on these matters. In extreme cases these inhibitions may result in impotence for the male; and most instances of impotence (prior to old age, and outside of those few cases where there is physical damage to the genitalia) are to be found among upper level, educated males. The psychiatrist well understands that such impotence is the product of inhibitions. The hesitancy of the inhibited male even to try to secure coitus is reflected in the fact that marital coitus in the more religiously inclined males (Chapter 13) and among upper level males in general (Chapter 10) occurs with significantly lower frequencies than marital coitus in the lower educational levels.

The inhibitions of the upper level female are more extreme than those of the average male. There are some of these females who object to all intercourse with their newly married husbands, and a larger number of the wives who remain uninterested in intercourse through the years of their marriage, who object to each new technique which the male tries, who charge their husbands with being lewd, lascivious, lacking in consideration, and guilty of sex perversion in general. There are numerous divorces which turn on the wife’s refusal to accept some item in coital technique which may in actuality be commonplace in human behavior. The female who has lived for twenty or more years without learning that any ethically or socially decent male has ever touched a female breast, and the female who has no comprehension of the fact that sexual contacts may involve a great deal more than genital union, find it difficult to give up their ideas about the right and wrong of these matters and accept sexual relations with any abandon after marriage. The girl who, as a result of pre-marital petting relations, has learned something about the significance of tactile stimulation and response, has less of a problem in resolving her inhibitions after marriage.

There is, then, considerable evidence that pre-marital petting experience contributes definitely to the effectiveness of the sexual relations after marriage. Some of those who have not had pre-marital petting experience do make satisfactory marital adjustments, but in many cases they make poorer adjustments. Although this conclusion is contrary to the usual statements in the sex education literature (e.g., Dickerson 1930, 1937, 1944, Popenoe 1938), it is in line with Terman’s findings (Terman 1938), and there have been some others (e.g.. Rice 1933, 1946, Taylor 1933, Himes 1940, Laton and Bailey 1940, Corner and Landis 1941, English and Pearson 1945, Adams 1946) who have arrived at more or less the same conclusion. Whether pre-marital petting is right or wrong is, of course, a moral issue which a scientist has no capacity to decide. What the relations of pre-marital petting may be to a subsequent marital adjustment, is a matter that the scientist can measure.

Social Significance
Among the females in the sample, petting had been significant because it had been the source of first arousal for about 34 per cent of those individuals who had ever been aroused erotically. Among those who had made their first responses in a heterosexual situation, petting had been the first source of arousal in 51 per cent of the cases.

Petting was the first source of orgasm for about a quarter (24 per cent) of all those females in the sample who had ever experienced orgasm. It had been the first source of an orgasm attained in a heterosexual relationship for 46 per cent of the females in the sample. It was, therefore, nearly as important a first source of orgasm as all kinds of coitus combined, including pre-marital, marital, and extra-marital coitus.

It is petting rather than the home, classroom or religious instruction, lectures or books, classes in biology, sociology, or philosophy, or actual coitus, that provides most females with their first real understanding of a heterosexual experience. They do not acquire such information from the general atmosphere of the homes in which they are raised, nor from specific instruction given by their mothers. On the contrary, the church, the home, and the school are the chief sources of the sexual inhibitions, the distaste for all aspects of sex, the fears of the physical difficulties that may be involved in a sexual relationship, and the feelings of guilt which many females carry with them into their marriages. Our records provide numerous illustrations of the problem which many females and males face when they try to learn in their late teens or twenties what they are biologically best equipped to learn soon after the onset of adolescence.
That pre-marital petting may provide an introduction to the emotional adjustments necessary in marriage is also suggested by: Dell 1930:298 (helps fit a girl for marriage). Terman 1938:257, 393 (somewhat higher frequency of climax in marriage where the pre-marital petting was most frequent—a CR of 1.5). Levy and Munroe 1938:37 (a healthy preparation for marriage). Squier in Folsom 1938:135 (“within the confines of true affection petting is a part of the art of love, deserving intelligent and gentle cultivation”). Landis et al. 1940:101 (females with petting experience tend to have better sexual adjustment in marriage). Paul H. Landis 1945:265. Macandrew 1946:63-87 (suggested as a substitute for pre-marital coitus). Brown and Kempton 1950: 142 (a legitimate preparation for a normal sex life). Terman 1951:136.

The failure of a female to reach orgasm in her marital coitus may be a considerable source of marital discord. In an attempt to identify some of the sources of this difficulty, we have examined the possibility of a correlation between pre-marital experience in orgasm, and the frequencies with which the female responds to the point of orgasm in her subsequent marital coitus. The data indicate that among the females in our sample who had never experienced orgasm prior to marriage, 44 per cent had completely failed to reach orgasm in their first year of marital coitus. On the other hand, among those who had had a fair amount of orgasmic experience prior to marriage, only 13 per cent had failed to reach orgasm in that first year of marriage. This is a difference of considerable magnitude. Differences which lay in the same direction were apparent in the later years, and even for fifteen years after marriage.
Attempts to analyze the relation between pre-marital petting experience and marital adjustments may be found in: Davis 1929:59-60 (116 wives of unhappy marriages showed higher incidence of petting than wives of happy marriages). Terman 1938:255-256 (marital happiness scores somewhat higher for females who never petted in high school).

The correlations between petting when it was the specific source of pre-marital orgasm, and orgasm in the subsequent marital coitus, are of a similarly high order. Among the females who had never done petting to the point of orgasm before marriage, 35 per cent had never reached orgasm in the first year of marriage. On the other hand, among those who had reached orgasm in at least some of their pre-marital petting, only 10 per cent had failed to reach it in the first year of marriage. Similar differences were apparent for some fifteen years after marriage.

Selective factors are probably involved. The girls who respond to orgasm in pre-marital petting are probably those who are basically most responsive, and they, therefore, are the ones who are most likely to make better sexual adjustments after marriage. But we are inclined to believe that causal relationships are also involved, for our further analyses indicate that the sources of the pre-marital experience are not as important as the fact that the girl actually reaches orgasm before marriage.

But petting provides a great deal more than experience in orgasm. It introduces the female to the physical, psychologic, and social problems that are involved in making emotional adjustments to other individuals. As a socializing agent, pre-marital petting had been of considerable significance to a great many of the females in the sample.
Petting as a socializing agency is noted in: Dell 1930:177. Blanchard and Manasses 1930:60, 191. Folsom 1938:109-111. Corner and Landis 1941:14 (strong interest in the opposite sex, a healthy sign of a development of personality; a certain amount of practical experimentation in petting, practically inevitable). Adams 1946:32-33. Harper 1949:81-83. Brown and Kempton 1950:142. Comfort 1950:96-98. Wangson 1951:107 (Swedish government report on sex problems of youth. Considers petting harmless and natural).

The various petting techniques are, because of our social taboos, adopted only gradually in the course of the female’s pre-marital experience. She may accept simple kissing long before she accepts deep kissing. It may be a considerable time before she accepts breast contacts, and genital contacts may seem unacceptable until there has been a considerable amount of experience. Mouth-genital contacts are accepted even more slowly. The pre-marital years provide a training period for learning these things. After marriage such gradual learning is not so often possible. Most males will not temporize and allow their wives months and years for the development of their sexual techniques. When difficulties arise in pre-marital relations because of the refusal of the female or sometimes the male partner to accept particular techniques, the relationships may be broken up; and while that may seem unfortunate, it is not as disastrous as breaking up a marriage. Even when a marriage is not dissolved by a sexual disagreement, it may be carried along at such a low level of satisfaction that the relationships are rarely mended.

Pre-marital petting experience provides an opportunity for the female to learn to adjust emotionally to various types of males. Thus she may acquire some wisdom in choosing the particular male with whom she hopes to make a permanent, life-long adjustment. A good deal has been said about the danger of allowing a satisfactory pre-marital sexual relationship to decide the choice of a partner without due regard for the other non-sexual qualities that should be taken into account, and we have seen a few marriages get into difficulties because they were based on sexual interests alone; but we have seen many hundreds of marriages ruined by the failure of the partners to learn before marriage that they could not adjust emotionally or sexually to each other.

It is sometimes said that pre-marital petting may make it difficult for the female to be satisfied with coitus in marriage. The statement has never been supported by any accumulation of specific data, and we have not seen more than three or four such cases. On the other hand, we have the histories of nearly a thousand females who had done pre-marital petting and who had then responded excellently in their marital coitus.
The dangers of a fixation on petting are hypothesized in: E. R. Groves 1933: 114. G. H. Groves 1942:185. Clark 1949:55-56. Brown and Kempton 1950: 142. Duvall 1950:245.

Moral Interpretations
Judeo-Christian codes specifically condemn the deliberate search for or acceptance of activities which bring erotic arousal without having procreation as their ultimate objective. The general disapproval of petting in this country and in much of Europe reflects this moral tradition. Physical contacts between nude bodies or nude parts of bodies, except for the limited genital contacts which are necessary for procreation, are forbidden.

While none of the petting techniques are in themselves identified as sinful in the Catholic moral philosophy, the code is specific in considering such activities sins if they constitute anything more than aids to marital coitus. The coitus must be had in a fashion that offers a reasonable opportunity for a pregnancy to result.
Catholic codes on petting may be summarized as follows: All sexual pleasure, complete or incomplete, can be lawfully desired or deliberately enjoyed only in marriage. Chaste touches are permitted to engaged couples if for pleasure of sensation but not for venereal pleasure. Petting in marriage likewise may not be for pleasure, but only as leading to coitus or as a sign of mutual love. The proper purposes of coitus are primarily generation of offspring, and secondarily faith owed to a spouse, calming of concupiscence, and fostering of conjugal affection. On sin of petting outside of marriage, see: Ballerini 1890(2):679, 683, 688, 703 (kisses, embraces, looks, touches, and similar things outside of marriage are venial or mortal sins). Arregui 1927:147-148 (any venereal pleasure outside of marriage is a sin). O’Brien 1950:221 (“sexual pleasure, be it complete or incomplete, may be lawfully desired, caused directly or deliberately enjoyed only by those in the state of matrimony”). On petting in marriage as a preliminary to coitus, see: Sanchez 1637:302, 313 (if for purposes of showing mutual love, it is legitimate; if for purposes of increasing pleasure in coitus, then a venial sin; but if for genital pleasure, it is a mortal sin. Every venereal act not related to coitus is mortal). Ballerini 1890(6) :292. Arregui 1927:533. Davis 1946(4) :252 (since marital coitus is honorable, all acts preceding which aid in having coitus forthwith are lawful. Hence, before coitus it is permitted to married persons to arouse sexual impulses, but one must beware that such acts do not provoke very near danger of pollution in either person. If, however, by chance, rarely, and beyond intention pollution should follow, there would be no sin). On purposes of marital coitus, see: Sanchez 1637:193. Arregui 1927:530. Davis 1946(4):253.

Protestant groups have reflected many of the same attitudes, and most of them still condemn all pre-marital socio-sexual activities. Nevertheless, the Protestant clergy and laity have at times compromised with these demands. While the Catholic code allows no exception, some Protestant groups are inclined to accept petting between persons who are engaged or who are seriously considering the possibility of becoming engaged to marry. An increasing number of the Protestant clergy and laity, moreover, have begun to believe that pre-marital petting may have some value in developing the emotional capacities of youth and in contributing to their future marital adjustments.

Evidently the religious and public condemnation of petting has had a minimal effect on the attitudes and behavior of the youth of more recent generations, but many of those who engage in petting do so with some sense of guilt. There is probably no single aspect of sex about which American youth more often ask questions and seek scientific information. When the guilt reactions are extreme, they may give rise to a variety of personality problems, sexual maladjustments, difficulties in making social adjustments, various types of impotence, some times the substitution of homosexual activities, and still other difficulties which may do damage to the subsequent marital adjustments.
Our record on the incidences and frequencies of petting provides a measure of the attitudes of American youth themselves. Surveys of attitudes are also reported in: Blanchard and Manasses 1930:263. Pringle 1938:14. Bernard 1938:355. Christensen 1950:226. A. Ellis 1951:72-75. Christensen 1952:585.

A great deal has been written about the damage that may be done by pre-marital sexual activities, and particularly by petting; but relatively little has been said about the psychologic disturbances and subsequent marital difficulties which may develop when there is such condemnation and constant belaboring of any type of behavior which has become so nearly universal, and which is as likely to remain as universal, as petting is among American females and males.
    The dangers of petting are emphasized, for instance, in: Fowler 1875:544. Wood-Allen 1905:165. U. S. Public Health Service 1930:7. E. R. Groves 1933:114. Exner 1933:13-14. Edson 1936:8-9. Waller 1937:728. Crisp 1939: 21. G. H. Groves 1942:185. Popenoe 1943:76-82. Duvall and Hill 1945:54-56. Dickerson 1947:50-51. Duvall in Fishbein and Burgess 1947:41. Stephens in Fishbein and Burgess 1947:48-51. Kirkendall 1947:24-26. Landis and Landis 1948:72. Duvall 1950:242, 245. Bundesen 1951:86, 123-126.
    A European and psychoanalytic viewpoint is available in Biederich and Dembicki 1951:84-90, which runs as follows: Petting is not genuine human sexuality, but a man-made act to produce orgasm. The problem is fairly new, although by now the United States is used to this double standard. Orgasm in petting is an orgasm ‘‘reached, not experienced.” Petting may lead to disappointment in coitus, impotence, and premature ejaculation. Since it does not occur in animals [!], petting is the most unnatural of sexual activities.

Legal Implications
Anglo-American sex law is largely derived from and follows the religious codes on most issues.
May 1931: ch. 5, 13. 

While petting as a specific type of activity is not legally condemned, many of its particular techniques are punishable as misdemeanors or more serious crimes. When a minor is involved, petting may be prosecuted as juvenile delinquency or as a contribution to the delinquency of a minor.
The genital manipulation of a female child may contribute to her delinquency. See: State v. Stone 1924:226 Pac. (Ore.) 430. But see: State v. Moore 1952: 241 P.2d (Ore.) 455 (hugging, kissing, and playing with breast insufficient under indictment charging “fondling of private parts”). In a court handling girls between 16 and 21 years of age, in one of our large cities, we have observed many cases in which evidence of genital manipulation in petting was taken as sufficient grounds for judging the girls to be “morally depraved,” and for committing them to institutions for relatively long terms.

For petting which an adult carries on with a very young minor, the laws in many states impose penalties which are among the most extreme in the criminal code.
There are now 27 states having statutes which penalize indecent liberties with a child. Examples are: Penal Code of California:§288 (child under 14, offender over 18, penalty 1 year to life). Michigan Comp. Laws 1948:750.336 (child under 16, male offender over 16, improper and indecent liberties not amounting to intercourse, sodomy or gross indecency, maximum penalty 10 years or 1 day to life). Minnesota Statutes Ann. 1947:§617.08 (child under 16, age of offender not specified, maximum penalty 7 years). State v. Kocher 1941:119 P.2d (Mont.) 35 (attempting to remove dress as part of sexual play). State v. Gilmore 1926:150 N.E. (111.) 631 (putting hands under dress, tickling legs of 11 year old girl). But see: State v. Rounds 1933:248 N.W. (la.) 500 (hugging, kissing, not lewd and lascivious behavior).

There are, however, few and only sporadic and capricious attempts to enforce such laws when the petting partners are of about the same age and when there has been mutual consent. There are a few instances of the prosecution of petting as assault and battery, particularly where the girl had not consented or was below the age of consent.
Interpretations of petting as assault and battery where the female had not given her consent are in: Moreland v. State 1916:188 S.W. (Ark.) 1. Corpus Juris Secundum (6):924. Arizona Code 1939:§43-603. Interpretations ot petting as assault and battery because the female was below the age at which she was capable of consent, are in: People v. Gibson 1922:134 N.E. (N. Y.) 531. Hanes v. State 1900:57 N.E. (Ind.) 704. Snyder v. State 1915:110 N.E. (Ohio) 644. Miller v. State 1912:150 S.W. (Tex.) 635. Beausoliel v. U. S. 1939:107 F.(2d) 292. See also Burns Indiana Statutes 1933:§10-403 as amended in 1951 by ch. 277. Also see Ohio Criminal Code 1945:§12423-1. The reasoning, of some of the courts seems to be that a female below the age of consent, being without capacity to consent to an act of coitus, is by analogy incapable of consenting to any touching of a sexual nature. There are some courts which have rejected this line of reasoning; see: N. Y. Law Revis. Comm. 1937:86.

Most of the cases that get into court are instituted by irate parents or outraged neighbors. When the petting occurs in some public place, as in a moving picture theatre, on a beach, or in a car parked on some public highway, the police are more likely to take action. In most instances they simply put an end to the activity; in some instances they may make an arrest on a charge of public indecency or disorderly conduct. The charges are likely to be more severe if genital manipulations or mouth-genital contacts are involved, for the latter at least may be penalized as felonies in most of the forty-eight states.
See: Michigan Comp. Laws 1948:§750.338b (forbidding a private grossly indecent heterosexual act) and New Jersey Statutes Ann. 1939:§2:140-1 (forbidding any lewd or carnally indecent act in private). Both of the above seem to include genital manipulation among the unmarried and provide maximum penalties of 5 and 3 years respectively. Indiana and Wyoming treat as sodomy any enticing, alluring, instigating, or aiding of a person under 21 to commit masturbation, and this has been interpreted to include any immoral act of sexual gratification which has a tendency to corrupt; see Burns Indiana Statutes:§10-4221. In Texas, permitting a person under 16 to handle or fondle one’s sexual parts is sodomy, and in Oregon in addition to mouth-genital and anal contacts any “perverse” genital contact is the crime against nature. In Arizona, in addition to oral and anal intercourse any body contact intended to arouse the sexual desires of a person in “any unnatural manner” is a felony. Although historically sodomy was confined to anal intercourse, today in most states some or all forms of mouth-genital contacts are specifically forbidden either as part of the sodomy statutes or in separate statutes. In many of the other states some or all mouth-genital contacts are included by judicial decision in the term “crime against nature” or sodomy; or mouth-genital contacts have been considered to be ‘‘unnatural” or “perverse” or “lascivious” or “grossly indecent” conduct under statutes forbidding such conduct.

Our histories include cases of law enforcement officers blackmailing the apprehended youth into making a financial settlement to avoid arrest. The utter caprice of such legal action provides an example of the impossibility of controlling behavior which is so nearly universal. Few American youth are aware that any legal question is involved; and if they were aware, most of them would deliberately ignore the law. The mores, rather than the legal mandates, provide whatever restraint there is on the petting behavior of present-day American females and males.

Physiologic Significance
As we have already noted, petting is most often accepted because of the immediate satisfactions which it may bring. We have seen that it had provided a physiologic release in the form of orgasm for about 39 per cent of the females in the sample, and nearer 45 per cent of the younger generation of females.

However, physiologic difficulties may develop if there is considerable arousal in the petting and the activity is not carried through to orgasm. In such a case, most males and some females find themselves nervously upset, disturbed in their thinking, incapable of concentrating on other matters, and inefficient in their motor reactions. They may develop severe pains in the groin. Before they can resolve these disturbances, they may have to resort to strenuous physical exercise, and not infrequently they masturbate or seek coitus or sometimes homosexual relations. While most females are not as disturbed as males when petting activity stops short of orgasm, there are some who are as disturbed as any of the males. Among the females in the sample who had had any petting experience, half of them (51 per cent) recorded that they had been disturbed on some occasion, although only a smaller percentage had found themselves regularly disturbed. A quarter (26 per cent) reported pains in the groin which were similar to those which males frequently experience when they are erotically aroused and fail to reach orgasm. About a third of the females (35 per cent) had masturbated, at least on some occasion, after the petting had been concluded, just as many males do.
It is notable that the female's masturbation following petting seems to be reported only in Talmey 1910:103 and Davis 1929:168. It is warned against in Weatherhead 1932:38.

Such disturbances depend primarily on the fact that erotic arousal involves the development of neuromuscular tensions which may rise to a considerable peak in the course of sexual activity. From that peak the tensions are suddenly released if orgasm occurs. For some reason which we do not yet understand, it is difficult for most males and some females to find release from any high level of sexual tension except through orgasm. If there is no orgasm, it may take some time and even hours to resolve these tensions. If there is orgasm, the tensions may be released in a matter of seconds or a minute or two, and the individual finds the comfort and peace which is characteristic of all completed sexual activity—unless it is contaminated with guilt reactions.
 
Summary and Comparisons of Female and Male
Pre-Marital Petting
  In Females In Males
Phylogenetic Origins
Occurs in all mammals Yes Yes
Techniques basically as in human Yes Yes
May prolong sex play without coitus Yes Yes
Sex play is initiated by: Less oftenMore often
Orgasm may occur without coitus Doubtful Yes
Historically ancient in all cultures Yes Yes

Relation to Age

Accumulative incidence

Petting experience Abrupt rise Abrupt rise
By age 15 39% 57%
By age 1881% 84%
By age 25 91% 89%
Petting with erotic response 83% Almost all
Petting to orgasm Gradual rise to 39% Gradual rise to 31%

Active incidence of orgasm

At adol.-153% 18%
At 16-20 23% 32%
At 21-2531% 29%

Frequency (active median) to orgasm

Average at ages 15-55 4-6 per year 3-5 per year
Maximum7-10 per week 7 per week

Percentage of total outlet

At adol.-154% 1%
At 16-25 18% 3%
At 36-40 5% 1%

Number of years involved

1 year only 8% 
2-5 years 38% 
6 years or more 54% 
Median individual 6-7 years  

Number of partners

1 only 10% 
2-5 32% 
6-10 23% 
Over 10 35% 

Relation to Age at Marriage and Educ. Level

Accumulative incid. uniform
for uniform age of marr.		 YesNo. Higher in high school
and college groups
Active incidence of orgasm Little relation Marked relation
Frequency to orgasm No relation Some relation
Percentage of total outlet Little relation Marked relation
Relation to Parental Occupational Class Little or none Little or none
Relation to Decade of Birth Marked Some
Accumul. incid.
petting experience (by age 35)		 Steady increase Some increase
Born before 1900 80% 
Born 1900-1909 91% 
Born 1910-1929 Nearly 99%  

First experience, median individ.
Born before 1900 By age 18  
Born after 1920 Between ages 15-16  
Accum. incid.,
petting to orgasm (by age 35)		 Increase from 26 to 53% 
Active incidence of orgasm
(e.g. at ages 21-25)		  Marked increase  
Born before 1900 15% 
Born 1900-1909 32% 
Born 1910-1919 34% 
Born 1920-1929 37% 
Frequency to orgasm No relation Some relation!
Relation to Age at Onset of Adolescence Little or none Little or none
Relation to Rural-Urban Background
 Accumulative incidence, experience No relation  
Accumulative incidence, to orgasm Urban higher  
Active incidence of orgasm Little relation Some relation

Relation to Religious Background
Accumulative incidence, experience Little relation  
Accumulative incidence, to orgasm For less devout, twice as high as in devout  
Active incidence of orgasm  Little relation Some relation
Frequency of orgasm (active median) No relation Little or no relation
Percentage of total outlet No relation Little or no relation

Petting as a Measure of Capacities

Accumulative incidence
Experience curve develops Abruptly Abruptly
Is a measure of sexual interest Less often More often
Petting to orgasm curve develops Gradually in all groups Abruptly in college group
Is a measure of sexual interest Yes 

Frequency
Maxima limited more oftenYes No
Minima set more often No Yes

Techniques of Petting
Most extended: college groupsYes Yes
Most extended: recent generations Yes Yes
Oral techniques most taboo Yes Yes
Maximum among those
with most coital exper.		 Markedly so No
Moral and Legal Attitudes
Religious codes condemn Yes Yes
Laws of most states condemn
When minor is involved ? Yes
As assault and battery ? Yes
As public indecency Yes Yes
As disorderly conduct Yes Yes
As sodomy Yes Yes
Physiologic Significance of Petting
Provides erotic satisfaction Sometimes for 83% Usually for 91%
Provides release in orgasm Sometimes for 39% Sometimes for 31%
Contributes to total outlet 4-18% 3% or less
Nervous disturbance if no orgasm Sometimes for 51% For many
Sometimes leads to masturbation in 35% Many
Social Significance of Petting
Source of first erotic arousal 34% Rarely
Source of first orgasm 24% 1% or less
Educates in socio-sexual relations Yes Yes
Contributes to choice of a spouse Yes Yes
Contributes to improvement
of marital coitus		 Definitely Yes, to some degree

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