Ricerc@Sapienza

Objectives: The literature shows a few biopsychosocial studies
on sexual desire in men. The aim of this study was to evaluate the
role of selected psychological and social variables affecting male
sexual desire such as Quality of Life (QoL), sexual function,
distress, satisfaction, psychological symptoms, emotions, alexithymia,
couple adjustment, sexism, cognitive schemas activated
in a sexual context, sexual dysfunctional beliefs, and different
classes of cognitions triggered during sexual activity about failure
anticipation, erection concerns, age and body related thoughts,
erotic fantasies, and attitudes towards sexuality.
Material and Method(s): A wide self-administered survey
reached 450 heterosexual Italian men (age 31.36±10.73) from
the general population with a snowball sampling. Thirteen
questionnaires exploring psychological and social elements involved in sexual response were administrated: the “International
Index of Erectile Function”, the “Short Form 36 for the
QoL”, the “Symptom Check List-90-Revised”, the “Positive and
Negative Affect Schedule”, the “Toronto Alexithymia Scale”, the
“Premature Ejaculation Severity Index”, the “Sexual Distress
Scale”, the “Sexual Satisfaction Scale”, the “Dyadic Adjustment
Scale”, the “Ambivalent Sexism Inventory”, the “Sexual Modes
Questionnaire”, the “Sexual Dysfunctional Belief Questionnaire”,
and the “Questionnaire of Cognitive Schema Activation
in Sexual Context”.
Result(s): Results showed “Orgasmic Function” (b¼.258),
“Lack of Erotic Thoughts” (b¼-.248), “Erection Concerns
Thoughts” (b¼-.191), “Hostile Sexism” (b¼.166), and “Positive
Affect” (b¼.143) as the main predictors sexual desire in this
group. “Depression”, “Premature Ejaculation Severity”, “Sexual
Distress”, “Sexual Conservatism” and “Helpless” showed weaker
effects. Sexual Functioning (14.90%), Emotional Response
(13.50%) and Negative Automatic Thoughts (11.80%)
explained more variance in sexual drive.
Conclusion(s): Our findings showed that male sexual desire
could be affected by many psychological and social elements.
Other factors remain to be explored, in their direct and interactive
effects, aiming to better explain male sexual desire functioning.
Analyzed variables could represent important factors that
should be considered in the assessment of desire concerns and
discussed in therapy.
Disclosure: Work supported by industry: no.