TY - JOUR
T1 - Attitudes of U.S. and Czech/Slovak mental health and health professionals toward five types of sexually explicit materials
AU - Robinson, Beatrice Bean E
AU - Scheltema, Karen
AU - Koznar, Jan
AU - Manthei, Robin
PY - 1996/12
Y1 - 1996/12
N2 - Mental health and health professionals' attitudes toward sexually explicit materials in the U.S. and Czech/Slovak Republics were investigated. An instrument measuring attitudes toward educational, soft-core, hard-core, violence, and bizarre/paraphiliac sexually explicit materials was administered to sexologists, psychologist/counselors, and medical professionals. These professionals were attending conferences in the U.S. and the Czech/Slovak Republics between November 1992 and September 1993. Mental health and health professionals had the most favorable attitudes toward educational sexually explicit materials followed by soft-core and hard-core materials, respectively. They had unfavorable attitudes toward violent and bizarre/paraphiliac sexually explicit materials, with particularly negative attitudes toward violent materials. Analysis of covariance showed that strength of religious conviction was a significant covariate; thus professionals with stronger religious conviction had more negative attitudes toward all five types of sexually explicit materials. When controlling for strength of religious conviction: (i) sexologists had more positive attitudes toward most types of sexually explicit materials; (ii) Czech professionals generally had more positive attitudes toward such materials than their U.S. counterparts; and (iii) there were few differences between female and male professionals in their reported attitudes. While previous literature has reported gender differences in attitudes toward sexually explicit materials, findings from this study suggest that this effect may be due to differences in religiosity among women and men, namely that women tend to be more religious.
AB - Mental health and health professionals' attitudes toward sexually explicit materials in the U.S. and Czech/Slovak Republics were investigated. An instrument measuring attitudes toward educational, soft-core, hard-core, violence, and bizarre/paraphiliac sexually explicit materials was administered to sexologists, psychologist/counselors, and medical professionals. These professionals were attending conferences in the U.S. and the Czech/Slovak Republics between November 1992 and September 1993. Mental health and health professionals had the most favorable attitudes toward educational sexually explicit materials followed by soft-core and hard-core materials, respectively. They had unfavorable attitudes toward violent and bizarre/paraphiliac sexually explicit materials, with particularly negative attitudes toward violent materials. Analysis of covariance showed that strength of religious conviction was a significant covariate; thus professionals with stronger religious conviction had more negative attitudes toward all five types of sexually explicit materials. When controlling for strength of religious conviction: (i) sexologists had more positive attitudes toward most types of sexually explicit materials; (ii) Czech professionals generally had more positive attitudes toward such materials than their U.S. counterparts; and (iii) there were few differences between female and male professionals in their reported attitudes. While previous literature has reported gender differences in attitudes toward sexually explicit materials, findings from this study suggest that this effect may be due to differences in religiosity among women and men, namely that women tend to be more religious.
KW - Czech/Slovak
KW - cross- cultural
KW - gender
KW - pornography
KW - professionals' attitudes
KW - sexually explicit materials
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0029804733&partnerID=8YFLogxK
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U2 - 10.1007/BF02437842
DO - 10.1007/BF02437842
M3 - Article
C2 - 8931883
AN - SCOPUS:0029804733
SN - 0004-0002
VL - 25
SP - 601
EP - 628
JO - Archives of sexual behavior
JF - Archives of sexual behavior
IS - 6
ER -