New Studies Map the Mind of the Rapist - New York Times 1991
“For most men, hearing a description of an encounter where the man is forcing the woman to have sex, and the woman is in distress or pain, dampens the arousal by about 50 percent compared to arousal levels during a scene of consenting lovemaking, … .”
AND:
In a series of experiments, Dr. Barbaree and his colleagues investigated what circumstances might make the arousal patterns of normal men more like that of the rapists. Becoming angry at a woman, Dr. Barbaree found, is one such circumstance.
Men who thought they were participating in a study of the effects of physical exercise on sexual arousal were asked to pedal a stationary bicycle as fast as they could for one minute. After they had finished, a young woman confederate of the experimenter entered into the room, ostensibly on an errand, noticed the amount the man had pedaled, and made a disparaging remark: “Is that all you can do? I pedaled a lot more than that myself this morning.”
“When these men subsequently went into the lab, they had the same degree of arousal to the rape as to consenting sex,” Dr. Barbaree said.
In other experiments, Dr. Barbaree also found that men were more likely to be aroused by viewing a rape scene if they had been drinking or if they believed the woman portrayed had been “asking for it.” Theory Is Challenged
Dr. Barbaree sees this line of research as refuting the scientific theory that had seen rapists as unique in having a sexual preference for combining violence and sexual arousal. “With the right combination of factors, most men can be aroused by violent sex,” Dr. Barbaree said.
But that mix of psychological ingredients may not in itself be enough to set the psychological stage for rape, in the view of Dr. Barbaree and other researchers.
“Rapists often recall being intensely angry, depressed or feeling worthless for days or even months leading up to the rape,” Dr. Barbaree said. “Very often the rapists say that the trigger for the rape was when a woman made them angry, usually by rebuffing a sexual overture. The men experienced the rebuff as an insult to their manhood that intensified their emotional misery.”
Researchers caution that there is no single psychological formula that explains every rapist.
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