- Beáta Bőthe ORCID:orcid.org/0000-0003-2718-47031,2,
- Réka Bartók2,
- István Tóth-Király1,2,
- Rory C. Reid3,
- Mark D. Griffiths4,
- Zsolt Demetrovics2 &
- …
- Gábor Orosz2,5
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Abstract
Criteria for hypersexual disorder (HD) were proposed for consideration in the DSM-5 but ultimately excluded for a variety of reasons. Regardless, research continues to investigate hypersexual behavior (HB). The Hypersexual Behavior Inventory (HBI) is one of the most robust scales assessing HB, but further examination is needed to explore its psychometric properties among different groups. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to examine the generalizability of the HBI in a large, diverse, non-clinical sample (N = 18,034 participants; females = 6132; 34.0%;Mage = 33.6 years, SDage = 11.1) across both gender and sexual orientation. Measurement invariance testing was carried out to ensure gender- and sexual orientation-based comparisons were meaningful. Results demonstrated when both gender and sexual orientation were considered (i.e., heterosexual males vs. LGBTQ males vs. heterosexual females vs. LGBTQ females), LGBTQ males had significantly higher latent means on the HBI factors. Results also demonstrated LGBTQ males had the highest scores on other possible indicators of hypersexuality (e.g., frequency of masturbation, number of sexual partners, or frequency of pornography viewing). These findings suggest LGBTQ males may be a group most at risk of engaging in hypersexual behavior, and LGBTQ females are at a higher risk of engaging in hypersexual activities due to coping problems. Given the large-scale nature of the study, the findings contribute to the currently growing body of the literature on hypersexuality.
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Acknowledgements
The research was supported by the Hungarian National Research, Development and Innovation Office (Grant Nos.: PD116686, FK124225, K111938) and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (Lendület Project LP2012-36). The third author (ITK) was supported by the ÚNKP-17-3 New National Excellence Program of the Ministry of Human Capacities.
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Doctoral School of Psychology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
Beáta Bőthe & István Tóth-Király
Institute of Psychology, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Izabella utca 46., Budapest, 1064, Hungary
Beáta Bőthe, Réka Bartók, István Tóth-Király, Zsolt Demetrovics & Gábor Orosz
Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Rory C. Reid
Psychology Department, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK
Mark D. Griffiths
Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience and Psychology, Hungarian Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest, Hungary
Gábor Orosz
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Bőthe, B., Bartók, R., Tóth-Király, I.et al. Hypersexuality, Gender, and Sexual Orientation: A Large-Scale Psychometric Survey Study.Arch Sex Behav47, 2265–2276 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-018-1201-z
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