Chapter 1
<< A Boy’s and Girl’s Sex Life >>
Growing Up in a New Sexual World

Sex means different things to different people. For some, the word means simply reproduction. To others, it means behavior, like the changes in the body that occur when someone is sexually aroused. Changes can result from various kinds of psychological stimulation, or they can be caused by self-stimulation or by another person. Some people have a much broader idea of sex. To them it means how a boy or a girl acts and feels simply because he’s a boy or she’s a girl trying to find out what role he’s or she’s to play in our society.

People who argue about whether a growing boy or girl should have a sex life or not are completely missing the point. Every boy or girl does. It’s only a question of the kind of sex life he or she has.

There are four principal choices open to them, four ways of expressing themselves sexually. By far the most usual is masturbation, which is common to boys and girls all over the world. Nearly all human males masturbate, everywhere; some authorities say there are no exceptions, and if there are, they constitute only the tiniest of minorities. Masturbation is very familiar for girls of all ages too. Other outlets are petting, which most boys and girls do when they reach adolescence or even before, and actual intercourse with a girl for a boy and with a boy for a girl, but that happens only with a minority of boys and girls. Finally, there is homosexuality, which is sex play between members of the same sex.



When we look at a child, it's not the differences on the inside that we see, but those on the outside. The irony is that although the internal genitalia (testicles and ovaries) develop from two separate duct systems, the external genitalia of men and women are actually derived from the same tissues! The genital tubercle (which will become the penis or the clitoris), urogenital groove and sinus, and labioscrotal folds appear in all fetuses by the end of the 7th week of development. What they develop into depends on whether or not they're stimulated by the fetal androgens (testosterone and dihydrotestosterone, or DHT). If they're not stimulated by these androgens, they develop into the female sex organs — the clitoris, urethra, vagina, and labia. If they are stimulated by androgens, they merge into the two male sex structures — the penis and scrotum. The external genitalia are, therefore, thought of as homologous structures . . . which is just a way of saying that they're really very similar. In a male, what would be the clitoris in a female lengthens into the penis, the urethra becomes enclosed in its shaft, and the labia fold to enclose the testicles as the scrotum.
«To your beginning as a cell, egg and sperm had each contributed 23 chromosomes, each chromosome carrying its hundreds of genes like beads on strings. The sperm’s 23 chromosomes paired up with the egg’s 23 chromosomes, giving the new cell 23 pairs, or a total of 46 chromosomes. Only one pair determined your genetic sex. Mothers always contribute an X to the sex-regulating pair, so everybody gets at least one X. Fathers contribute either an X or a Y. If an X-carrying sperm won the swimming race, you are a chromosomal female; if a Y won, you are a chromosomal male.

From your beginning as a single fertilized cell that multiplied rapidly, your cells soon clustered to form the rudimentary organs of an embryo. Sexually, it was an allpurpose embryo with the growth buds — embryologists call them anlagen—of either male or female organs. First there’s a pair of gonads, which can develop into either testicles or ovaries. Then there are two sets of internal genital ducts or tubes. One of these sets of structures, called wolffian after Kaspar Wolff, the eighteenth-century anatomist who identified it, develops into seminal vesicles, prostate gland and the long tubes, one on each side, called the vasa deferentia, for a male. The other structure, called mullerian for the nineteenth-century anatomist, Johannes Muller, develops into a uterus, fallopian tubes, and upper vagina in a female. There is also a tiny, protruding bud of tissue called a genital tubercule, which can adapt itself for either sex, becoming either a penis or a clitoris. Below the genital tubercule is an opening that fuses together in a male, or stays open in a female.

For six weeks after conception, XX and XY embryos proceed along the same neutral road of sex development. At the end of the sixth week there’s a fork in the road, one branch leading in the male direction. At that point, the Y chromosomes of a male embryo send a message somehow, nobody yet knows how, to the two gonads, left and right, ordering them to proliferate, develop tubular structures, and become testicles. If you had no Y to divert you, you went on for another six weeks before the primitive, undifferentiated gonads began to develop definitely into ovaries packed with egg cells, enough to last you a lifetime. If you got a second X from your father to go with the one from your mother, the double-X chromosomes steered you onto this female branch.

Although the XX or XY chromosomal pattern you had when you were only one cell is duplicated in every cell of your body even now, the sex chromosomes’ influence ended once their sex-determining message was dispatched to your gonads. So far as is known, the sex chromosomes have never again played any direct part in programming your sex life.

When it has differentiated as a testicle, the gonad starts manufacturing sex hormone. Cholesterol, a chemical relative of fat, is the raw material for the sex hormone production line. From cholesterol the testes first synthesize progesterone, a progestin known as the pregnancy hormone; then androgen, the masculinizing hormone; and finally estrogen, the feminizing hormone. Testicles carry the process through to make some estrogen, but nothing like as much as ovaries produce. Chemically speaking, they are all closely related, but each hormone has its specific functions and each takes various forms. Progestin is called the pregnancy hormone because a woman’s progestin level goes up during pregnancy (and also after ovulation during the course of the menstrual cycle in preparation for a possible pregnancy). While androgen is called the male hormone, estrogen the female hormone, and progestin the pregnancy hormone, these names are somewhat misleading since everybody normally keeps all three sex hormones in circulation. The difference is in the proportion of the mixture. Testicles produce enough androgen to dominate the estrogen in a male, while ovaries produce enough estrogen to dominate the androgen in the female. With the sex hormones, it’s a question of threshold — of more or less rather than either-or.

The amount of sex hormones produced and the proportion of each in the mixture are not the same in all men or in all women, nor do they stay the same in any one individual. Variation normally stays within limits, however. Variation beyond the normal limits, especially at a critical period of prenatal life, can have dramatic consequences.

Your hormone mix steered you at the fork in the prenatal road where your embryonic internal genital structures, wolffian and mullerian, found their destiny. One set of structures began to develop, the other to wither away. If you are a man, your testicular hormone production during that critical prenatal period stimulated your wolflian structures to develop as seminal vesicles, prostate, and vasa. The mix also contained a special temporary substance that stopped your mullerian structures in their tracks. If your prenatal hormone mix was not masculine, your mullerian structures went ahead in the normal female way and developed as a uterus, fallopian tubes, and upper vagina, while your wolflian structures began to atrophy. Note that in this second case you didn’t need a female hormone mix. Ovarian hormone production appears to be irrelevant to prenatal female sex differentiation. It takes a male hormone mix to make the wolflian structures develop, and it takes that special temporary hormone called simply “mullerian-inhibiting hormone,” which is secreted during this period by testicles, to keep the mullerian structures from pursuing their ambition to become a uterus, fallopian tubes, and upper vagina, but it takes no hormonal push at all for this stage of development to proceed in feminine fashion. While the absence of a Y chromosome and the presence of at least two X chromosomes are needed to make a gonad become an ovary, as soon as the gonad fork is passed, the neutral road and the female road converge. Unless there is a sufficient push in the male direction, the fetus will take the female turn at any subsequent fork, whether there is a female push or not. Nature’s first choice is to make Eve. Everybody has one X chromosome and everybody is surrounded by a mother’s estrogens during prenatal life. Although not enough for full development as a fertile female, this gives enough momentum to support female development. Development as a male requires effective propulsion in the male direction at each critical stage. Unless the required “something more” is provided in the correct proportions and at the proper times, the individual’s subsequent development follows the female pattern.

Males are generally more vulnerable to sexual differentiation errors than females. If any one of your sexual systems fail, you can coast down the female road, but not down the male. Population statistics support the general proposition of male vulnerability. Males lead at conception by something like 140 to 100, but at birth that lead has been whittled down to 105 to 100. While many factors obviously influence the statistics, nevertheless the trend continues throughout life. The forty-year-old population of the United States is now divided almost evenly between men and women, but in the older age groups women outnumber men, and among those sixty-five and older there are only 70 men left for every 100 women still living.

After your chromosomal sex and your gonadal sex were settled, your hormone mix established, and after one set of your reproductive organs had begun to develop, the other to atrophy, you came to the last fork in the sexual differentiation road before birth, namely, the molding of your external genitals. Here, too, the sex hormones called the turn. “Molding” is the right word because the materials for fashioning either model are the same. Beside the genital tubercule and single opening, the materials are a fold or strip of skin and a small swelling on each side of the opening.

Female molding needs no hormone stimulus, only the absence of male hormone. If your hormone mix was not male, the genital tubercule stayed small to become your clitoris; the two folds of skin did not fuse but stayed separate as the two labia minora and the hood of the clitoris; and the two swellings remained separate as the two labia majora. The opening developed a dividing wall to separate the entrance of the vagina leading to your uterus from the urethra connecting with your bladder.

If your hormone mix was masculine, the genital tubercule became your penis, and the two folds of skin, fusing in a seam on the underside, wrapped themselves around the penis to form a urethral tube. The two swellings fused together and formed a scrotum to receive your testicles when they descended, which they probably did about seven months after you were conceived. The urethral tube connected with your bladder and your prostate gland, vasa deferentia, and testicles. (It is the vasa deferentia that are cut in a vasectomy, an operation that more and more men are electing as a birth control method, for the vasa carry the sperm from the testicles to mix with fluid from the prostate to form semen.)

This last turning point, the molding of your external genitals, got you an M or an F on your birth certificate.»

      (Money, John and Patricia Tucker. Sexual Signatures: What it Means to be a Man or a Woman)
A few real differences between boys and girls affect their attitudes and sexual behavior with each other. One of the most striking differences is that boys are more oriented toward their genitals, generally speaking, and are a little more concerned with genital activity. A girl is more interested in the things surrounding sex than with sex itself. If girls and boys understood this simple fact, they’d be better able to get along with each other. They learn to be partners of each other, with equal needs, responses, and responsibilities.

For boys, sex is often an awareness of changes in their bodies — physical changes that happen when they’re sexually aroused. That can happen when they see pictures, read books, hear stories, think of sexy situations, touch people of the opposite sex or the same sex, or touch their own bodies. Arousal means that the blood rushes to the surface of the skin and makes it warm; the penis hardens and becomes erect, increasing in size from about three-and-a-half to six inches; and the breath comes faster. These things can happen every day of their lives.

Girls often don’t know that this is happening to boys, and don’t realize it can even be a source of embarrassment to them, especially when they have to stand up in class and discover they have an erection. Boys are afraid others will see the bulge in their jeans.

When a boy goes out with a girl, his awkwardness and shyness may mean he’s fighting against the sexual response he feels. Even if the girl is completely unaware of it, the boy doesn’t know that. All he knows is how embarrassed he’d be if she knew.

When girls are aroused, they go through the same kind of bodily changes boys do — that is, they feel warm and flushed and their breath comes faster. Instead of an erection, their genital area becomes damp because arousal has activated glands that lubricate the vagina, so that in intercourse, if it occurred, the penis would slip in more easily. Girls who have never been aroused to that point are usually surprised if they find out other girls have had such sensations.

If this kind of stimulation continues, in both boys and girls, it will increase in intensity until a pitch of excitement is reached that may be uncontrollable. At that point, sometimes a sudden release of sexual tension occurs, a kind of explosion that varies in intensity, followed by a quiet, relaxed, blissful feeling. This release of tension is what we call an “orgasm,” or sexual climax. Sometimes it happens when people fondle each other, or it may happen (and most often does) during intercourse, or when a girl or boy rubs the sex organ. It can even happen at night while a boy (or girl) is dreaming about sex. That’s called a “nocturnal emission” or a “wet dream”.

A boy may wake up at night, or in the morning, to find he’s had an ejaculation while he was asleep. That may be puzzling, even frightening, to boys who’ve heard it said that the loss of semen in sleep is somehow damaging. Actually, it’s no more damaging than the loss of it in masturbation or intercourse. It’s simply the result of sexual excitement, usually through dreaming, which eventually reaches the point of climax with the emission of semen. It isn’t an automatic substitute for intercourse, or a means of relieving sexual tension. In fact, it may often come soon after a sex experience.

Some girls understand why their response to sexual stimulation isn’t the same as it is for boys, even though the reaction may be much the same physically. They can see why it is that a boy feels more at home with sex. It’s because sex is so much a part of his life. Girls have sexual needs and desires, too, and respond when they’re aroused, but most, particularly the younger ones, are still restrained about expressing their feelings, even though they have a freedom they never had before.

For a boy, arousal and erection begin a drive toward orgasm or multiple orgasms, if he has the opportunity. Studies of sexual behavior show this in a dramatic way. By the time they’re fifteen, nearly all boys (99.7%) are having orgasm on the average of two or three times a week. For two-thirds (2/3) of them, their first orgasm comes from masturbation; for one-fifth (1/5), from sexual dreams; and for less than one-sixth (1/6), from fondling a girl. Less than one in ten (1/10) has had orgasm from intercourse. Most boys keep on having orgasm from masturbation.

It’s a different story with girls. Only about half (53%) the girls have been aroused at all by any means at fifteen, according to the Kinsey Report of more than fifty years ago, but certainly that figure would be higher today. Even in that earlier study, however, it was clear that rapid changes took place in the next five years. At the age of twenty, about nine out of ten (89%) had experienced some kind of arousal. At fifteen only a fourth (23%) had an orgasm from any source, but five years later the figure was more than half (53%). About a third (1/3) were aroused by masturbation, a third (1/3) by being fondled, and another third (1/3) through psychological stimulation — books, fantasies, dreams, or whatever. Two-fifths (2/5) experienced their first orgasm from masturbation, one in twenty (1/20) from dreams, a fourth (1/4) from being fondled, one in ten (1/10) from premarital intercourse, a surprising one in six (1/6) from marital intercourse, and 3 percent (3/100) from homosexual contacts. All these figures, as I’ve said, are undoubtedly higher today, perhaps much higher.

Statistics are often dull, but here are a few that will tell you something about why a girl may be having trouble with her boyfriend. Nearly all boys have orgasms at fifteen, and they have them two or three times a week. They’re going out with girls of the same age, more or less, but three-fourths (3/4) of them aren’t having any orgasms at all. The other fourth have one only once every two weeks. No wonder there’s trouble when two adolescents with such widely different sex experiences go out together. It’s easy to see why so much misunderstanding occurs.

The problem is that males are sexually mature and active at thirteen or earlier, but girls develop more slowly sexually, in spite of the fact that biologically they’re ready for sex at increasingly earlier times. A boy is at his sexual peak during adolescence, and then becomes gradually less active as he grows older, although some men are still active in their nineties. Women develop more gradually. They reach a peak of responsiveness in their thirties, forties, or even fifties. Their response is not only as great as the men’s but can be even more intense. Consequently the problems of adolescence can go right on into adult life, and they’re not easily solved unless there’s real understanding on both sides.

Important sexual differences exist among girls themselves, and people often find it hard to understand that there’s a wide range of sexual interest and responsiveness among them. By “people,” I mean boys especially. They usually have no idea that there are some girls who are simply not interested in sex at that point in their lives. They also don’t understand that many girls are not easily aroused by pictures, books, or by what they see in the movies, unlike boys. But that doesn’t mean they’re apathetic about boys. They may like them, and want to go out with them and enjoy their company. Sex simply hasn’t yet become a part of their conscious lives.

Not all girls are in this category, of course. A relatively small number are even more easily aroused than boys by seeing, reading, and thinking of sexual things. They have orgasms frequently, quickly, and easily, and have a real struggle to keep out of trouble in a society that may try to restrict their behavior. They may also have difficulty in their own teen-age society if most of the other girls aren’t as uninhibited, which is usually the case.

Between these two extremes is a large class of girls, of whom most are much closer to the “unresponsive” end of the scale than to the uninhibited end.

With such differences among themselves, and between themselves and boys, girls often find it hard to adjust to the world they live in.

For example, if a girl has sex with a boy, she steps out of the role society has assigned to her at that age, and often both she and the boy wind up being confused about what’s happened to them. Or a girl may reject what her parents and society think, but then she has to be aware that there may be penalties to pay if what she’s doing becomes known. It’s easy for a girl to be confused if she sees permissiveness all around her while she’s subjected to the social pressures put on her by parents and other members of the adult community. Sometimes these girls don’t know where to turn or how to behave.

In that case, it may be fortunate that sex isn’t as much of a problem for girls as it is for boys, by and large, nor even as much of a problem as their parents may think it is. Sex, in fact, is less important to girls than their public image. By contrast, boys aren’t as concerned about their sexual reputations and may even be proud to be considered “studs.” Girls, however, are often painfully conscious of what other people think of them, and especially what other girls think. In spite of their new freedom, they’re still fearful of getting a bad reputation, or of being known as easy marks for boys who want sex, or of being outside the accepted social pattern.

Girls don’t talk about sex, as sex, the way boys do, generally speaking. Boys talk about sex a lot. They constantly trade information or make jokes about it. Much of what they think they know may be wrong, and they’re inclined to exaggerate their own sexual exploits.

On the other hand, girls’ conversation centers on going out, and clothes, and the personalities of individual boys, not on their probable availability for sex or on specific sexual activities. Their view of sex is more, romantic, and that’s something boys ought to know and remember.

If a girl is asked, “Do you have any sex dreams at night?” she’ll often answer, “Yes,” and if she’s asked about the content of her dreams, what she tells you shows quite clearly the difference between what boys and girls mean when they say “sex.” The girl will say she dreamed about being with a boy somewhere, having fun with him that isn’t necessarily sexual. If she says she dreamed of making love with a boy, it usually turns out that she didn’t mean intercourse, or even mutual fondling, but something dreamlike, warm, and affectionate happening between her and a boy she likes.

This kind of romantic feeling is what girls usually dream about, awake or asleep, rather than some particular kind of sexual behavior. Her night dreams and daytime fantasies are quite different from what boys experience. Boys dream or fantasize about fondling a girl in different ways, including all the details, possibly including intercourse, and experiencing one sexual sensation after another.

Girls are rarely so specific. For them, the dream or the fantasy is a romantic setting in which they experience a warm and happy feeling of being with a boy. Girls tend to be interested in the things that surround sex — that is, the time, the place, the mood — rather than in the specific physical aspects of the act itself. When girls talk to other girls about boys and sex, they tend to speak more in generalities, of how “cute” the boy is, or how “nice.” Sometimes, however, they may also talk about his build, or his good looks, or even the bulge in his crotch.

It’s too bad that girls can’t talk with their parents about sex. They might understand themselves better. But it’s no more possible for them in most cases than it is for the boys. Fathers find it especially difficult to talk with daughters because so many of them don’t want to think about their being involved sexually with boys. They have a legitimate fear that a daughter might get pregnant, but a large part of their problem is the reluctance to admit that their little girls are growing up. Normally, fathers are jealous of this maturing. They don’t want to give up their daughters to boys, who are seen subconsciously as male rivals.

As for mothers, they’ve lived through this adolescent period themselves and have struggled with the same problems. Most of them have known what it is to worry about when to have some kind of sexual activity with boys, to be curious about sex and look for answers no one appears to want to give. Whatever their adolescent experience happened to be, they’re likely to transfer it to their daughters.

What else should a girl know about sex as she grows up, and after she understands the fundamental differences between herself and boys?

I think she ought to know something about the sexual parts of her own body, to become familiar and comfortable with it. She should have the same knowledge about boys. She ought to know what causes the changes in her body when she’s sexually aroused. She ought to have some insight into her early sexual experiences and understand what effect they may have on her later life. It would also be helpful to have more information about her social relations with boys — going out with them, for example — and about sexual relations, too — specifically, sexual activity that stops short of intercourse.

A girl also ought to know what intercourse is like and understand what’s involved, pro and con, before she commits herself to it. In short, how she can tell when she’s emotionally ready for sex. Few girls these days wait until they’re married. For a long time now, therapists and feminist writers have been stressing how important it is for a girl to know something about the stimulation of her own body and to have a better understanding of the meaning of sexual relations between members of the same sex. She needs to know how different boys and girls can be when it comes to sexual behavior and attitudes, in ways I’ve already touched on. All this will determine to a major extent how good her sexual adjustment will be, either in marriage or in some other relationship.

If a girl has such a body of knowledge, I think she’ll come to understand that she will have to be something of an actress in life. Clearly she’s been given three roles to play. One is her role in society, first as a young girl growing up, then as a wife and mother, or as a career girl, or a combination of both. A second role is her relationship with boys as she grows up, in which she has to learn to adjust to social roles and at the same time develop her own sexuality. It’s the third role that’s most difficult — the role she must play as herself, an individual responsible to herself.

No actress in the theater or the movies could have a more difficult combination of roles. As an adolescent, she’s engaged in learning how to adjust to society, to the adult world. Yet she has to get along with boys, who may have the same expectations of her as the adult world does, and at the same time regard her as a sexual object, no matter how much feminists may protest the fact. Yet in spite of all this, a girl has her own self, her own feelings, to consider. It isn’t easy.

What else should a boy know about sex as he grows up, and after he understands the fundamental differences between himself and girls?

There are boys, like some girls, who are “late bloomers” in the sense that they’re not really interested in sex until their late teens. After that they have an active sex life.

I had one patient, a boy of twenty-four, who had never experienced an erection in his life because his body was deficient in male hormones. On the other side of the coin, there are boys who seem interested in sex almost from the time they’re born. They learn masturbation to orgasm quickly and may do it several times a day. Sometimes they continue an active sexual life until they’re old men. Most boys come somewhere between these extremes.

If an individual, either boy or girl, is a highly sexed person, there isn’t much that can be done to decrease his or her activity, even if anyone wanted to do it. They would sleep and slut around “sowing their wild oats” and come off as an eligible bachelor boy/girl, or stud/filly, or playboy/playgirl, even if their conduct becomes scandalous and public. But if you’re at the low end of the scale, it’s also true that there isn’t much you can do about that, either. People don’t have much choice but to accept their level of sexuality, whatever it is.

Boys and girls who are too concerned about being loved will soon begin to worry about how much people love them, and how long they’re going to keep on doing it. But they don’t realize that if they were constantly loved, they would also have to be constantly lovable, and for most of us that would be impossible. Even if it were possible to win the approval of everyone you want to love you or approve of you, it would take all your time and energy to do it, and you’d find yourself living for what others thought of you instead of pursuing your own goals.

There are four things you can do.
       1.    First, ask yourself what you want to do in life, rather than what other people want you to do.
       2.    Second, you should be willing to take risks and commit yourself and not be afraid of making mistakes, to get what you want out of life.
       3.    Third, focus on loving rather than on being loved.
       4.    And finally, above everything else, stop confusing being loved with your feelings about your own personal worth.

Boys and girls who have a great “need” for love and approval may really be trying to compensate for their feelings of worthlessness. In effect, they’re saying: “I must be loved because I am a worthless, incompetent individual who cannot possibly get along in the world by fending for myself, so I need to be helped and cared for by others.” But “wanting” love is a different thing. Nearly everyone wants love because that is the most important way human beings connect with each other. It’s perfectly normal.

And what is abnormal? I can’t really answer this question, even though the phrase is used so much, because the word “abnormal” is ambiguous. The question can’t be given a definite, clear-cut answer. Let me explain that a little more.

Abnormal sex can mean something unusual or rare, so by that definition it is abnormal to have masturbation by hanging from the chandelier — to take a really far-out example — because few if any people have masturbation in such a position. Using that definition, however, masturbation has to be considered normal (as it is) because most boys and girls masturbate.

Another way of defining “abnormal” is to say it’s anything unnatural. Since human sexual behavior is like that of other animals, it has to be considered natural. All mammals, of which humans are a species, engage in practically every kind of sex, masturbation at the first place included, so by this definition there is essentially nothing that humans do sexually that can be called abnormal.

A third way to look at “abnormal” is through the eyes of society. Our laws and churches are the guide here, although they’re not always in complete agreement. In fact, some churches today are much more liberal than they used to be. For example, it isn’t against the law to masturbate, except in public, but some religious people think it’s wrong. On the other hand, it’s against the law in about half the states to put your mouth on the sex organ of another person. Many religious leaders don’t believe this is wrong, and many husbands and wives, as well as other people, do it.

Still another way to think about “abnormal” is to consider what sexual acts harm other people. That would include forcing other people to engage in sexual behavior against their will, or lying to them, cheating them, or seducing them in order to get them to do what they don’t want to do. All these could be considered abnormal.

Comparison of observable sexual behaviors of children and adults
Developmentally expected
Moral, social or familial rules may restrict, but these behaviors are not abnormal, developmentally harmful, or illegal
when private, consensual, equal, and non-coercive.
Prepubescent Postpubescent
• Genital or Reproduction conversations with peers or similar age siblings • Sexually explicit conversations with peers
• Show me yours/I'll show you mine with peers, playing "doctor" • Interest in erotica
• Imitating seduction (i.e., kissing, flirting) • Sexual innuendo, flirting and courtship
• Simulating foreplay with dolls and peers • Foreplay (petting, making out, fondling)
• Simulating intercourse with dolls and peers • Monogamist intercourse (stable or serial)
• Dirty words or jokes within cultural or peer group norm • Obscenities and jokes within cultural norm
• Hugging, kissing, holding hands
• Solitary masturbation
• Mutual masturbation
• Group masturbation

Requiring Attention
• Sexually explicit conversation with peers, sexual innuendo, teasing • Polygamist sexual intercourse (promiscuity)
• Preoccupation with masturbation
• Preoccupation with sexual themes
• Sexual anxiety (interfering in daily functioning)
• Sexual aggressiveness/obscenities

• Mooning and obscene gestures

• Pornographic interest
• Sexual graffiti (especially chronic or impacting individuals)
• Violation of other’s body space (pulling other's skirt up or pants down, intervention into bathing and sleeping)
• Embarrassment of others with sexual themes
• Precocious sexual knowledge
• Peeping
• Exposing
• Public frottage, petting, humping, French kissing
• Sexual contact with significant age difference (child sexual abuse)
• Simulating intercourse with animals

Requiring Correction
• Sexually explicit conversations with significant age difference
• Touching genitals of others without permission (i.e. grabbing, goosing)
• Degradation/humiliation of self or others with sexual themes
• Attempting to expose others' genitals

• Inducing sexually explicit fear
• Sexually explicit proposals/threats of force including written notes
• Chronic peeping/exposing/obscenities/pornographic interests/frottage
• Compulsive masturbation (especially chronic or public)/task interruption to masturbate
• Masturbation which includes vaginal or anal penetration
• Sexual contact with animals (bestiality)

Requiring Prohibition
• Oral, vaginal, anal penetrations  

• Obscene phone calls, voyeurism, exhibitionism, frottage, sexual harassment
• Forced exposure of other's genitals
• Forced sexual contact (sexual assault)
• Forced penetration (rape)
• Genital injury to others
• Any genital injury of bleeding not explained by accidental cause
Stable monogamy is defined as a single sexual partner throughout adolescence.
Serial monogamy indicates long-term (several months or years) involvement with a single partner which ends and then others follow.
Polygamist intercourse is defined as indiscriminate sexual contact with more than one partner during the same period of time.

Now, keeping those thoughts in mind, focus on loving, relax and enjoy yourself and learn. This book is for you. It won’t tell you what kind of sex you should have or how often you should have it, but it will tell you what’s happening to you when you do it, whatever it is, and it will tell you something of how you may feel about it. It’s better to know than to wonder and imagine. Boys and girls should be equally responsible for what they do or don’t do.

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