Date of Award

2000

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Psychology (PsyD)

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Cerny,Jerome

Abstract

The present study investigated that extent to which the race of actors in an erotic video affected sexual arousal in African-American and Caucasian heterosexual males.It was hypothesized that the two racial groups would be significantly more sexually aroused while watching their respective homoethnic erotic video.The htpothesis was grounded in the modeling effects of Bandura's Social Leaning Theory(1977),the Matching Hypothesis(1982)and worldview differences between African-Americans and Caucasians(Baldwin and Bell,1985.Thirty-four African-American and Caucasian males were shown homoethnic and non-homethnic erotic videos while penile circumference,systolic and diastolic blood pressures,and self-report ratings of sexual arousal were measured.In addition,sexual attitude measures and an xultural identity questionnaire were given to the participants to assess whether sexual attitudes and cultural identity questionnaire were given to the participants to assess whether sexual attitudes and cultural identity were related to sexual responitivity.The hypothesis was not supported.The results of this study showed that the race of actors in an erotic video did not affect differentially the sexual responding of the African-American and Caucasian men.However,systolic blood pressure tended to be a more sensitive indicator of general arousal in African-American men.While this study failed to support the hypothesis,the results did provide data relevant to the study of male sexuality in the laboratory setting.This area of research is still new and deserves more attention.

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