Aggressive and Humiliating Sexual Play: Occurrence Rates and Discordance Between the Sexes

Abstract

The present study attempted to understand people’s desires for aggressive and humiliating sexual play, both in terms of interests and fantasy. An evolutionary framework has been developed which generated five hypotheses to be tested. Evidence from a qualitative study of 102 participants identified 13 aggressive and sexual acts which were commonly preferred. A subsequent quantitative online study of 1026 men and women asked participants to rate the desirability of these acts. The results indicated that more than 70% of participants found at least one aggressive or humiliating sexual play desirable, whereas about half of the participants found at least three such acts desirable. Significant sex differences were also found, with men desiring to engage in such play more than women. This discordance was moderated by the willingness of each party to partially accommodate each other’s desires. On the basis of these findings and the proposed theoretical framework, it is concluded that aggressive and humiliating sexual play constitutes a normal variation in sexual desire.

Full text

Vol.:(0123456789)
1 3
Archives of Sexual Behavior
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-018-1266-8
ORIGINAL PAPER
Aggressive andHumiliating Sexual Play: Occurrence Rates
andDiscordance Between theSexes
MenelaosApostolou1 · MichalisKhalil1
Received: 7 September 2016 / Revised: 1 April 2017 / Accepted: 25 June 2018
© Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2018
Abstract
The present study attempted to understand people’s desires for aggressive and humiliating sexual play, both in terms of interests
and fantasy. An evolutionary framework has been developed which generated five hypotheses to be tested. Evidence from a
qualitative study of 102 participants identified 13 aggressive and sexual acts which were commonly preferred. A subsequent
quantitative online study of 1026 men and women asked participants to rate the desirability of these acts. The results indicated
that more than 70% of participants found at least one aggressive or humiliating sexual play desirable, whereas about half of the
participants found at least three such acts desirable. Significant sex differences were also found, with men desiring to engage
in such play more than women. This discordance was moderated by the willingness of each party to partially accommodate
each other’s desires. On the basis of these findings and the proposed theoretical framework, it is concluded that aggressive
and humiliating sexual play constitutes a normal variation in sexual desire.
Keywords Aggressive sexual play· Humiliating sexual play· Masochism· Sadism· Sex differences
Introduction
People frequently indicate an interest for sexual play that
involves aggressive and humiliating sexual acts (Janus &
Janus, 1993; Kinsey, Pomeroy, & Martin, 1948; Långström
& Hanson, 2006). For instance, a recent study in Canada
found that about one in five participants indicated a desire
for masochistic acts (Joyal & Carpentier, 2017). This kind
of play appears to be harmful for those involved, which in
turn, raises the question why there are so many people that
find it desirable. Yet, despite the high occurrence of these
desires in the population, there has been limited effort in
explaining why people have such desires; that is to say, if
they have a function and what this function may be (Daw-
son, Bannerman, & Lalumière, 2016; Quinsey, 2012). This
endeavor is even more challenging if an evolutionary per-
spective is adopted. Taking into consideration that aggressive
and humiliating sexual play may be potentially harmful or
drive partners away, we would expect selection forces to have
acted against any dispositions to prefer this type of sexual
play. The relatively high occurrence of these desires suggests
an evolutionary function, which currently remains obscure.
Accordingly, the current study had four goals, (1) To develop
an evolutionary framework that accounts for the desire for
aggressive and humiliating sexual play, and to employ this
framework in order to generate specific hypotheses to be tested,
(2) to identify the most common aggressive and humiliating
sexual acts people desire, (3) to estimate the degree of desire for
this type of sexual play, both in terms of interest and fantasies,
and (4) to estimate the degree of discordance between the sexes
over their desire for aggressive and humiliating sexual play.
Current Literature
Sexual desires can take at least two forms, namely an interest
to engage in an act and a fantasy to engage in an act (Leiten-
berg & Henning, 1995). Regarding the interest to engage in an
act, the first large-scale investigations that included measures
of paraphilic behaviors were the Kinsey studies which, by
employing non-representative samples (Kinsey etal., 1948;
Kinsey, Pomeroy, Martin, & Gebhard, 1953), found that 24%
of men (N = 5300) and 12% of women (N = 5940) had at least
some erotic response to sadomasochistic stories (i.e., acts
that involved the receipt or infliction of pain or humiliation).
Janus and Janus (1993) employed a representative sample of
* Menelaos Apostolou
m.apostolou@gmail.com
1 Department ofSocial Sciences, University ofNicosia, 46
Makedonitissas Ave., 1700Nicosia, Cyprus

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
2765 American adults, and reported a lifetime prevalence of
14% in men and 11% in women for sadomasochism, and 11%
in men and 11% in women for domination or submission.
Another study employed a representative sample of 2450
men and women from a 1996 national survey of sexuality and
health in Sweden, and found that 11.6% of the participants
responded positively to the question “Ever sexually aroused
by deliberately using pain” (Långström & Hanson, 2006).
A Brazilian study based on face-to-face interviews with
7022 individuals (the sample was not representative), 9% of
the participants reported that they had practiced sadomaso-
chism at least once in their lifetime (Oliveira & Abdo, 2010).
Moreover, a Canadian study combined online and telephone
interviews, in a representative sample of 1040 adults, in order
to investigate the desire and experience of several paraphilias
(Joyal & Carpentier, 2017). About 20% of the participants
indicated a desire for masochistic acts and about 5% a desire
for sadistic acts. In this study, women reported significantly
higher rates of masochistic desires and experience than men.
Another study assessed the interest in paraphilic activities in
a non-representative sample of 1226 Canadian individuals
(Dawson etal., 2016). With respect to sadism, 19% of men
and 10% of women, and with respect to masochism, 15% of
men and 17% of women, indicated arousal.
Proceeding to the aspect of sexual fantasies, Leitenberg
and Henning (1995) performed a literature review, and they
reported that men fantasized more about domination, whereas
women fantasized more about submission. An American
study of 137 college women investigated sexual fantasies
involving force or coercion against the fantasizer (Strassberg
& Lockerd, 1998). The results indicated that more than half
of the subjects reported having a forced-sex fantasy.
An online Canadian study, which employed a non-rep-
resentative sample of 1516 individuals, asked participants
to rate several sexual fantasies (Joyal, Cossette, & Lapierre,
2015). It was found that significantly more women (64.6%)
than men (53.3%) fantasized about being dominated sexually,
while significantly more men (59.6%) than women (46.7%)
fantasized about sexually dominating someone. Furthermore,
significantly more men (39.6%) than women (26.9%) fanta-
sized about spanking or whipping someone to obtain sexual
pleasure, and significantly more women (36.3%) than men
(28.5%) fantasized about being spanked or whipped to obtain
sexual pleasure. Finally, about an equal percentage of men
(30.7%) and women (28.9%) fantasized about being forced
to have sex, but significantly more men (22%) than women
(10.8%) fantasized about forcing someone to have sex.
The studies above were limited in not providing an actual
occurrence rate for desires for aggressive and humiliating
sexual play. Furthermore, most of these studies investigated
sadistic and masochistic desires as an aspect of paraphilia (e.g.,
Dawson etal., 2016). By grouping these questions with ques-
tions measuring different paraphilias, such as having a desire
to have sexual intercourse with a child, participants may have
been reluctant to answer positively, even if they had a desire for
aggressive and humiliating sexual play, because they may have
worried that they would be classified as deviant.
Another limitation of the existing literature is that it does
not provide a theoretical account of such desires. The few
theoretical attempts approached the subject as deviant and
dysfunctional behavior, and tried to explain it by attempting
to understand “what is wrong” (Holmes & Holmes, 2008).
Such analysis is limiting in explaining desires for aggressive
and humiliating sexual play, which appears to be a common
in the population. Accordingly, we aim to provide a theoreti-
cal framework which can account for these desires, and can
be employed in generating hypotheses about them.
Before proceeding, it should be said that most literature
uses the term “sadism” to connote a desire for inflicting pain
on a partner and “masochism” to connote a desire for suffer-
ing physical pain and humiliation. In the rest of the article,
we will not be using these terms; firstly, because this catego-
rization does not capture the full extent of aggressive and
humiliating sexual play, and secondly, because it suggests
deviant behavior, although we believe that desires of this kind
constitute normal variation in sexual behavior.
The Nature ofSexual Play
Women divert more parental investment to their children
and, as a consequence, they become the scarce reproduc-
tive resource to which men strive to gain access (Trivers,
1972). One way to achieve this goal is to fight other men and
monopolize access to women (Puts, 2010). As a consequence,
male–male competition arises, which is a selection force that
favors adaptations such as aggression and physical strength
that enable men to fight other men and gain reproductive
access to women (Andersson, 1994; Puts, 2010). There is
sound evidence that, during human evolutionary time, violent
conflict was frequent, and male–male competition was strong
(Puts, 2010, 2016). When male–male competition is strong,
men would frequently monopolize access to the women of
their opponents. In this case, consenting to sexual intercourse
is not optimal for women, as these men are not their choice.
Moreover, men may follow a forced-sex mating strategy,
where they force sex on women when the costs of doing so
are low (Thornhill & Palmer, 2000; for a summary of the var-
ious criticisms of this theory, see Travis, 2003). Rape is com-
monly reported in contemporary and historical pre-industrial
societies (Rozée-Koker, 1987; Sanday, 1981), suggesting that
it has also been common in ancestral pre-industrial societies.
Such strategies are against women’s interests. For instance,
in war-rape, a woman is likely to be left pregnant and raise
the child on her own (Sugiyama, 2014). Thus, women would
resist such male strategies (Thornhill & Palmer, 2000).
Last but not least, there is evidence that in ancestral human

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
societies mate choice was regulated (Apostolou, 2012, 2014).
The mate preferences of daughters are not aligned with the
in-law preferences of their parents (Apostolou, 2015; Buunk,
Park, & Dubbs, 2008; Perilloux, Fleischman, & Buss, 2011),
which suggests that women would frequently find themselves
married to men who do not comply with their preferences.
Accordingly, they would have the incentive to resist sex and/
or seek extramarital partners of their own choice.
In summary, there are good reasons to believe that during
human evolutionary time, men and women came recurrently
across the situation where their interests were not aligned.
In severe instances, it would be to men’s fitness interest to
have sex with these women, but it would not be to women’s
fitness interest to have sex with these men. As a consequence,
selection pressure would be exercised on women to resist
having sex with these men. For instance, women may become
aggressive and resistant to allow sexual access or to seek
other sexual outlets of their own choice. In turn, selection
pressure is exercised on men to evolve mechanisms that
would enable them to bypass women’s resistance and main-
tain exclusive control over their reproductive capacity.
Hypotheses tobe Tested
We propose that a preference to perform aggressive and
humiliating sexual acts on a partner has predominantly
evolved to enable men to bypass women’s resistance, but also
to intimidate and warn them about the consequences of infi-
delity or running away. For instance, a man who is aggressive
during sexual intercourse signals that he can be even more
aggressive in case of infidelity (see also Goetz, Shackelford,
Romero, Kaighobadi, & Miner, 2008). Thus, men are likely
to have evolved a predisposition to desire performing aggres-
sive sexual act on women. On this basis, we predict that:
H1 A substantial proportion of men would exhibit interest
and fantasy about performing aggressive and humiliating sex
on the partner.
As discussed above, when men attempt to force sex on
women, the latter would resist it by hitting, biting or spitting
on their partners (Thornhill & Palmer, 2000). If men would
find such resistance sexually undesirable, doing so would
compromise their forced-sex mating strategy, since it would
lead them to discontinue sexual intercourse. To put it differ-
ently, men who would find such resistance sexually exciting
would be more effective in applying such strategy than those
who would be indifferent or who would find such a reaction
repulsive. Accordingly, it is predicted that:
H2 A substantial proportion of men would exhibit interest
and fantasy for aggressive and humiliating sexual acts to be
performed on them.
Men and women have not only conflicting interests, but
converging interests as well. It is to both sexes’ reproductive
interest to form a stable long-term relationship, in which chil-
dren can be born and raised (Buss, 2017). During human evo-
lutionary time, women would recurrently find themselves to
be with long-term partners who have a desire for aggressive
and humiliating sex. We propose that it would benefit women
to partially accommodate this desire in order to promote
better intimate relationships. More specifically, women not
accommodating their partners’ desires could lead to negative
consequences, such as escalated aggression and an increased
chance of cheating. A taste for aggressive and humiliating
sex to be performed on self and on partner would be a way
to accommodate partners’ preferences and not suffer these
costs. On this basis, we predict that:
H3 A substantial proportion of women would exhibit inter-
est and fantasy for aggressive and humiliating sexual play.
Having the capacity to accommodate partners’ desires
does not mean that women’s desires will completely align
to men’s. In the proposed framework, men’s desires aim to
bypass resistance and promote control over partner; thus, it
would not be to the best interest of women to fully comply
with their partners’ desires, as doing so would lead to an
elevated risk of being injured, lose space to exercise choice,
and being totally dominated by a partner. Thus, women’s
desires for aggressive and humiliating sexual play do not
completely converge with the respective desires of men. In
particular, it is predicted that:
H4 Men would desire to engage in aggressive and humiliat-
ing sexual play more than women.
Furthermore, converging interests over mating suggest
that both men and women would be willing to allow aggres-
sive and humiliating sexual acts to be performed on self,
even if this is not in compliance with their desires, in order
to provide satisfaction to their partners. On this basis, it is
predicted that:
H5 The discordance that arises from the divergence in desires
would be lowered by people’s willingness to accept behaviors
in order to satisfy their partners.
Study 1
The purpose of this study was to identify the most common
desirable acts of aggressive and humiliating sexual play.

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
Method
Participants
Two research assistants were employed for the purposes
of this study. They recruited individuals who volunteered
to take part in research about sexual behavior (no payment
was given). The prerequisite for participation was to be an
adult (18years old or older). A snowball sampling tech-
nique was used, where the research assistants recruited first
several participants, and then obtained references for other
participants who were likely to be interested in participat-
ing. The first wave of participants was recruited online
through an advertisement that was placed at the university’s
website and from the university’s administrative staff and
students.
The study took place in the Republic of Cyprus, and par-
ticipants came predominantly from its two largest cities,
Nicosia and Limassol. The data collection process lasted
approximately 1month. The participants were initially asked
to sign a consent form, and subsequently they were given the
survey. They were instructed to complete the questionnaire
privately. Upon completion, they inserted the questionnaire
in an unmarked enveloped and sealed it.
A total of 102 Greek-Cypriots took part (50 women, 52
men). The mean age of women was 26.8years (SD = 8.7),
and the mean age of men was 28.3years (SD = 9.4). A total
of 40% of the participants were in a relationship, 29% were
married, 23.6% were single, and 7.4% were divorced.
Measures andProcedure
The survey had two parts. In the first part, participants were
asked to indicate any acts which involved elements of aggres-
sion and humiliation that they would prefer to engage in, or
they would fantasize to engage in, during sexual intercourse.
More specifically, they were asked to indicate the acts that
they would like to perform on a partner or their partner to
perform on them. Participants were specifically instructed
to leave this section blank if they did not have any such pref-
erences. In the second part, demographic information was
collected.
Results
In order to create a list of sexual acts that individuals desired,
acts with identical or very similar wording were eliminated by
two independent graduate students (a man and a woman) who
were recruited for this purpose. The students were selected on
the basis of having completed a qualitative research methods
course, and of having prior experience in qualitative data
analysis.
In instances where two or more acts were very similar,
one was retained and the rest were dropped. In addition,
acts that contained multiple behaviors were eliminated as
these were difficult to interpret. Finally, acts with unclear
or vague wording were also eliminated. If there was disa-
greement about retaining a given item, this was resolved by
consulting one of the authors. As our purpose was to iden-
tify the most common aggressive and humiliating sexual
acts people desire, we included only items which had a
reported frequency of 10 or more in the construction of the
final list. Overall, 13 such acts were identified, which are
shown in Table1. Note that these acts were found in both
active (i.e., to perform on partners) and passive (i.e., to be
performed on self) forms, but in order to save space, we
have stated them only in the latter form. Finally, note that
only four participants did not report any such acts, i.e., they
left the relevant section blank.
Study 2
The purpose of this study was to estimate the occurrence
of the desires for aggressive and humiliating sexual play,
and to test the hypotheses derived from the proposed evo-
lutionary framework.
Table 1 The factor structure for aggressive and humiliating sexual
play
In order to see the degree of cross-loading, we present the factor load-
ings for all the items on both factors, and we have placed in parenthe-
sis the factor loadings for the factor that the acts do not load
Factor loadings
On self On partner
Aggressive sexual play
Ties me .81 (.03) .84 (.04)
Handcuffs me .79 (.04) .85 (.09)
Pulls my hair .76 (.09) .59 (.21)
Bites me .74 (.18) .76 (.12)
Slaps me .61 (.23) .36 (.28)
Treats me aggressively .58 (.29) .60 (.29)
Looks at me aggressively .58 (.17) .64 (.10)
Hits me .54 (.29) .32 (.21)
Does things to me without asking .39 (.12) .48 (.12)
Humiliating sexual play
Swears at me .84 (.10) .84 (.03)
Humiliates me .83 (.03) .89 (.09)
Spits on me .68 (.00) .81 (.11)
Talks dirty to me .56 (.17) .48 (.34)

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
Method
Participants
The research was performed online. We chose this method
because of the sensitive nature of the study, and assumed
we could get more honest answers in this way (Kreuter,
Presser, & Tourangeau, 2008; Link & Mokdad, 2005). We
employed different approaches to recruit participants, (1)
We posted the link of the study to the official website and
Facebook profile of the university; (2) we employed insti-
tutional mailing lists; (3) we contacted university academic
and non-academic staff, and; (4) we asked post-graduate
students registered in psychology classes to forward the
link of the study to their relatives, friends, and acquaint-
ances, and to share also the link in their Facebook profiles.
The study was in Greek and the participants were Greeks
and Greek-Cypriots. In this study, 1026 individuals took
part (573 women, 453 men). The mean age of women
was 29.2years (SD = 11.4), and the mean age of men was
29.8years (SD = 10.3). A total of, 39.3% of the participants
were in a relationship, 36.3% were single, 30% were mar-
ried, and 4.4% were divorced.
Measures andProcedure
The survey was constructed using Google forms and it had
two parts. The first part was composed of five sections. In
the first section, participants were asked to indicate the
degree they desired that during sexual intercourse their
partners performed on them the 13 acts identified in Study
1. More specifically, participants were given the statement
“During sexual intercourse, I would like my partner to” and
they were provided with the 13 acts to rate. In the second
section, participants were asked to indicate the degree of
desire to perform these acts on their partners during sex-
ual intercourse. The participants were given the statement
“During sexual intercourse, I would like to” and they were
provided with the 13 acts to be performed on the partner
to rate.
In the third section, participants were asked to indicate
the degree that they fantasized about their partners per-
forming the 13 acts on them during sexual intercourse,
while in the fourth section they were asked to indicate the
degree they fantasized about performing themselves these
acts on their partners during sexual intercourse. Finally,
in the fifth section, participants were asked to indicate the
degree they would allow their partners to perform the 13
acts on them in order to satisfy them.
Participants’ responses were recorded on a 5-point Lik-
ert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly
agree). In addition, the order of presentation of each sec-
tion, and the order of presentation of the 13 questions in
each section was randomized across participants. Finally,
in the second part of the survey, demographic information
was collected.
Statistical Analysis
We applied principal components analysis in order to classify
items into aggressive and humiliating acts. We estimated the
frequencies of participants’ responses in order to construct
a hierarchy of acts by desirability. Moreover, we employed
MANCOVA in order to examine sex and age effects in
desire for aggressive and humiliating sexual play. Finally,
we employed ANCOVA in order to examine whether there
were significant differences in desire between aggressive and
humiliating sexual play, between interest and fantasies, and
between what people desired to be performed on them and
what they desired to perform on others.
Results
Study 1 attempted to identify acts that involved aggression
and humiliation. Therefore, the 13 acts needed to be classified
in two broad categories, namely aggressive and humiliating
acts. To examine whether this was the case, we performed
principal components analysis with direct oblimin as a rota-
tion method on the interest in the 13 acts to be performed
on self. The results suggested a two-factor solution (eigen-
value > 1). The KMO statistic was 0.94, indicating a very
good sample adequacy. The scales produced by this analysis
were checked by means of reliability analysis (Cronbach’s α).
For aggressive sexual play, the α was 0.86 and for humiliat-
ing sexual play the α was 0.74. As can be seen from Table1,
the first factor refers to aggressive sexual play acts, and the
second factor refers to humiliating sexual play acts. We per-
formed a similar analysis for the interest in the 13 acts to be
performed on a partner, and the results indicated a similar
factor structure (Table1). In this case, the KMO statistic was
0.91, and for aggressive sexual play, the α was 0.88 and for
humiliating sexual play the α was 0.81.
Occurrence
Our first goal was to estimate the occurrence rate, and in
particular how common it was for an individual to prefer
one or more of these acts. Accordingly, if for a specific act,
participants gave a score of “4” or “5,” we considered that
they found such an act desirable. On this basis, we estimated
the percentages of participants in the sample who found such
acts desirable for each scenario. The results shown in Table2,
where we can see that 77% of the participants indicated at

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
least one of these acts to be performed on them as desir-
able, while nearly half of the participants indicated at least
three acts as desirable. Moreover, 74.6% of the participants
indicated as desirable to perform at least one of these acts on
partner, while nearly half of the participants indicated at least
three acts as desirable. These rates were similar, but slightly
lower, for sexual fantasies. In addition, with respect to allow-
ing a partner to perform these acts on self, 73.9% of the par-
ticipants indicated that they would allow at least one act, and
more than half of the participants indicated that they would
allow at least three acts to be performed on them. Finally, we
can see that the occurrence rates differed between men and
women, with the most pronounced differences being over the
acts to be performed on partners, where men reported them
more frequently as desirable than women did.
We next examined which individual acts were deemed
more desirable. To do so, we estimated the percentages of
individuals who answered “4” or “5” in each act. The results
are shown in Table3. Starting from the aggressive sexual
play, the “Does things to me without asking” was the most
preferred act across different scenarios, while the “Hits me”
was the least preferred act. With respect to the humiliating
Table 2 The proportion of
participants who find aggressive
and humiliating sexual acts
desirable
All numbers refer to percentages
Acts On self-interest On partner-
interest
On self-fantasy On partner-
fantasy
On self-allow
Men Women Men Women Men Women Men Women Men Women
At least one 82.6 72.6 83.2 67.7 66.4 64.9 74.8 58.1 79.7 69.3
At least two 65.1 57.1 72.2 48.5 54.7 52.2 63.6 46.8 70.4 53.2
At least three 53.2 41.5 60.5 38.7 42.4 43.5 55 37.7 64.2 51.8
At least four 40.6 31.6 53.4 28.3 31.8 34 45.9 28.1 56.3 43.8
At least five 31.3 23 45.9 18.2 23.8 26.9 40 21.8 47.9 36.5
At least six 22.1 17.5 37.3 11.3 17.2 20.8 36 15.4 38.4 27.9
At least seven 15.7 11.3 30 6.6 13.7 16.1 29.6 10.3 33.6 21.8
At least eight 10.6 6.8 23.8 3.5 10.2 10.5 25.2 5.9 26.7 15.7
At least nine 7.1 4 19.2 2.1 6.6 7.5 17.4 3.3 23 10.5
At least ten 6.2 2.3 13.5 1 5.1 4.4 11.9 1.90 16.1 6.1
At least eleven 3.5 1.2 8.4 0.7 3.8 2.8 9.5 1.70 12.6 4.4
At least twelve 2.4 0.5 5.3 0.3 3.1 1.7 7.5 1.2 9.3 1.9
At least thirteen 0.9 0.2 2.2 0.2 1.8 0.5 3.3 0.3 6.4 0.9
Table 3 The proportion of participants who find individual sexual acts desirable
All numbers refer to percentages
On self-interest On partner-interest On self-fantasy On partner-fantasy On self-allow
Men Women Men Women Men Women Men Women Men Women
Aggressive sexual play
Ties me 24.6 20.5 37.1 22.2 24.9 27.8 34.6 24.7 43.5 35.3
Handcuffs me 25.8 18.7 35.2 21.3 23.9 27.6 34.7 23.6 44.2 37.4
Pulls my hair 22.1 36 50 26 18.4 33.9 44.3 24.1 36.1 41.4
Bites me 39.1 33.9 44 39.4 26.2 31.6 37.6 33 45.8 37.9
Slaps me 13.5 15.1 34.9 6.5 11.3 15.6 31.2 7.9 24.8 17.7
Treats me aggressively 26.3 25.5 37.3 15.4 26.1 26.7 37.9 19.9 41.9 27.5
Looks at me aggressively 42.5 37.1 36.8 30.4 32.6 34.4 34.2 28.9 57.9 45.1
Hits me 11.7 13.7 25.3 3.9 10.1 10.9 22.9 5.3 21.2 13.7
Does things to me without asking 52.5 33.6 56.2 36.8 44.5 36.7 53.2 34.3 58.4 40.6
Humiliating sexual play
Swears at me 19.5 6.6 24.5 1.8 16.7 8.2 25.2 5.8 31.6 12.3
Humiliates me 7.5 2.1 15 1.1 7 4 17.4 2.1 12.8 3.1
Spits on me 7.1 1.2 13.1 1.4 7.6 2.6 11.5 2.7 14.6 3.1
Talks dirty to me 49.8 29.2 47.5 21.5 34.6 26.9 38.5 22.4 53.1 36.1

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
sexual play, the “Talks dirty to me” was the most preferred
and the “Spits on me” the least preferred act.
Contingencies
Sex andAge Eects
In order to examine whether men and women differed in their
desires, we applied a MANCOVA, where the sexual play acts
were entered as the dependent variables and the participants’
sex as the independent variables. Age was also entered as a
covariate. We performed this analysis separately for aggres-
sive and for humiliating sexual play for each of the scenarios.
Please note that, for our analysis, we employed the raw data
without grouping any scores, as was the case above in order
to estimate occurrence rates.
Starting from aggressive sexual play on self, we can see
from Table4 that there was a significant main effect of sex.
However, the means for men and women were almost the
same, suggesting that certain acts were preferred more by
men and others more by women. Accordingly, acts such as
“Pulls my hair” were preferred more by women, while acts
such “Does things to me without asking” were preferred more
by men. Also, there was a significant effect of age with a
negative coefficient (F[9, 888] = 4.69, p < .001, ηp
2 = .045),
indicating that as people aged, their desire for aggressive
sexual play declined.
Moving on to humiliating sexual play, there was a sig-
nificant main effect of sex, with men preferring it more than
women. This difference was significant and in the same direc-
tion for all the acts. Also, there was a significant effect of
age with a positive coefficient (F[4, 898] = 2.66, p = .032,
ηp
2 = .012), indicating that the desire for humiliating sexual
play increased as people aged.
We now turn to examine aggressive sexual play on part-
ners. There was a significant main effect of sex, with men
indicating a stronger preference than women. This difference
was significant and in the same direction for all the constitu-
ent acts. Also, there was a significant effect of age, with a
negative coefficient (F[9, 873] = 4.50, p < .001, ηp
2 = .044).
Similarly, with respect to humiliating sexual play, there was a
significant main effect of sex, with men indicating a stronger
preference than women. This difference was significant and
in the same direction for all acts. Finally, there was a signifi-
cant effect of age with a positive coefficient (F[4, 895] = 2.61,
p = .034, ηp
2 = .012).
With respect to aggressive sexual play individuals would
allow to be performed on self in order to satisfy their partners,
there was a significant main effect of sex, with men indicat-
ing a stronger willingness than women to allow aggressive
acts. All significant differences in individual acts were in
this direction. Age was also significant (F[9, 875] = 2.76,
p = .003, ηp
2 = .028), with a negative coefficient. A similar
significant effect of sex, but with a larger effect size, was
produced for humiliating sexual play. In all acts, the sex dif-
ference was significant, with men exhibiting a higher will-
ingness than women. Finally, no significant effect of age was
found.
Moving on to sexual fantasies, from Table5 we can see
that, with respect to aggressive sexual play on self, there was
a significant main effect of sex, with the means being similar
for the two sexes. The sex differences were predominantly
over “Pulls my hair,” which was preferred more by women,
and over the “Does things to me without asking,” which was
preferred more by men. Note, however, that the sex difference
over the “Pulls my hair” could stem from men having hair that
is too short to pull. Moreover, there was a significant effect
of age with a negative coefficient (F[9, 873] = 4.50, p < .001,
ηp
2 = .044). Turning to fantasies for humiliating sexual play,
there was a significant main effect of sex, with men indicating
a stronger preference than women, a sex difference that was
consistent across all acts. In this case, no significant effect
of age was found.
With respect to fantasies for aggressive sexual play on
partner, there was a significant main effect of sex, with men
indicating a stronger preference than women. This difference
was significant and in the same direction for all acts. Fur-
thermore, there was a significant effect of age, with a nega-
tive coefficient (F[9, 858] = 4.46, p < .001, ηp
2 = .045). With
respect to fantasies for humiliating sexual play on partner,
there was a significant main effect of sex, with men indicat-
ing a stronger preference than women. This difference was
consistent across all acts. Finally, no significant effect of age
was produced.
Additional Main Eects andInteractions
We were interested in examining whether there were signifi-
cant differences in desire between aggressive and humiliat-
ing sexual play, between interest and fantasies, and between
what people desired to be performed on them and what they
desired to perform on others, as well as possible interactions
of these factors with sex. These effects could not be esti-
mated by extending the analysis above, since each category
of sexual play contained a different number and type of acts.
Therefore, direct comparisons were not possible. Thus, for
this purpose, we produced eight new variables, one for each
category (e.g., aggressive sexual play on partner) by aver-
aging the scores of the acts in each category. Using these
variables, we performed a four-way mixed design ANCOVA,
where the type of sexual play (aggressive/humiliating), the
type of interest (interest/fantasy), and the target (self/partner)
were entered as the within-participants variables, and the sex
of the participant was entered as the between-participants
independent variable. The age was also entered as a covariate.

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
Table 4 Sex differences in the interest for aggressive and humiliating sexual play
On self On partner On partner-allow
Total Men Women p value dTotal Men Women p value dTotal Men Women p value d
M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD)
Aggressive sexual play
Overall 2.55 (0.89) 2.59 (0.89) 2.52 (0.89) < .001 .08 2.58 (0.97) 2.92 (0.89) 2.31 (0.84) < .001 .71 2.83 (1.11) 2.98 (1.14) 2.71 (1.07) < .001 .24
Ties me 2.39 (1.29) 2.47 (1.34) 2.34 (1.24) .065 .10 2.52 (1.4) 2.85 (1.43) 2.31 (1.32) < .001 .40 2.91 (1.49) 3.09 (1.53) 2.86 (1.45) .008 .15
Handcuffs me 2.39 (1.3) 2.5 (1.37) 2.34 (1.24) .014 .12 2.5 (1.4) 2.79 (1.49) 2.3 (1.29) < .011 .35 2.92 (1.52) 3.13 (1.57) 2.85 (1.47) .003 .18
Pulls my hair 2.69 (1.34) 2.42 (1.3) 2.90 (1.31) < .001 .37 2.81 (1.42) 3.28 (1.37) 2.47 (1.34) < .001 .60 2.95 (1.48) 2.88 (1.49) 3.02 (1.46) .461 .09
Bites me 2.94 (1.25) 3.05 (1.29) 2.88 (1.2) .003 .14 3.03 (1.33) 3.13 (1.33) 2.94 (1.33) .010 .14 3.02 (1.45) 3.25 (1.44) 2.93 (1.42) < .001 .22
Slaps me 2.06 (1.23) 2.05 (1.22) 2.09 (1.25) .775 .03 2.1 (1.35 2.73 (1.46) 1.58 (0.99) < .001 .92 2.22 (1.39) 2.41 (1.47) 2.11 (1.33) .001 .21
Treats me aggressively 2.52 (1.29) 2.61 (1.32) 2.47 (1.27) .010 .11 2.46 (1.36) 2.86 (1.42) 2.14 (1.24) < .001 .54 2.75 (1.48) 3.09 (1.48) 2.56 (1.46) < .001 .36
Looks at me aggressively 2.98 (1.43) 3.06 (1.43) 2.92 (1.42) .010 .10 2.78 (1.43) 2.95 (1.44) 2.61 (1.4) < .001 .24 3.31 (1.52) 3.55 (1.55) 3.17 (1.49) < .001 .25
Hits me 1.93 (1.17) 1.91 (1.15) 1.95 (1.18) .850 .03 1.88 (1.22) 2.38 (1.38) 1.46 (0.86) < .001 .80 2.03 (1.34) 2.26 (1.43) 1.89 (1.25) < .001 .27
Does things to me without asking 3.1 (1.36) 3.48 (1.27) 2.81 (1.35) < .001 .51 3.2 (1.4) 3.54 (1.31) 2.88 (1.39) < .001 .49 3.25 (1.45) 3.66 (1.37) 2.96 (1.42) < .001 .50
Humiliating sexual play
Overall 1.87 (0.8) 2.11 (0.9) 1.69 (0.64) < .001 .49 1.8 (0.93) 2.22 (1.12) 1.46 (0.56) < .001 .87 2.05 (1.02) 2.37 (1.15) 1.80 (0.82) < .001 .57
Swears at me 1.86 (1.16) 2.16 (1.3) 1.62 (0.98) < .001 .48 1.76 (1.21) 2.31 (1.46) 1.34 (0.74) < .001 .84 2.16 (1.41) 2.67 (1.53) 1.80 (1.21) < .001 .63
Humiliates me 1.36 (0.84) 1.51 (1) 1.25 (0.67) < .001 .31 1.43 (0.98) 1.83 (1.31) 1.13 (0.51) < .001 .70 1.50 (1.05) 1.77 (1.31) 1.32 (0.79) < .001 .41
Spits on me 1.33 (0.83) 1.50 (1) 1.18 (0.59) < .001 .39 1.4 (0.97) 1.71 (1.24) 1.14 (0.52) < .001 .60 1.52 (1.08) 1.81 (1.32) 1.28 (0.76) < .001 .49
Talks dirty to me 2.93 (1.36) 3.28 (1.37) 2.68 (1.28) < .001 .45 2.61 (1.44) 3.06 (1.48) 2.25 (1.28) < .001 .59 3 (1.53) 3.38 (1.54) 2.77 (1.47) < .001 .40

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
The results indicated a significant main effect of the type
of sexual play (F[1, 761] = 223.73, p < .001, ηp
2 = .227),
with aggressive sexual play to be preferred more than
humiliating sexual play. Moreover, there was a significant
main effect of sex (F[1, 761] = 58.5, p < .001, ηp
2 = .071),
with men indicating a stronger desire than women.
There was a significant interaction between the type of
interest and sex (F[1, 761] = 12.84, p < .001, ηp
2 = .017),
where women gave similar scores for interest and fantasies,
but men gave higher scores for interest than for fantasies.
Moreover, there was a significant interaction between the
type of interest and the target (F[1, 761] = 15.94, p < .001,
ηp
2 = .021). In particular, individuals gave similar scores
for interest and for fantasies about performing aggressive
and humiliating sexual play on others. They gave, however,
higher scores for interest than for fantasizing about such
play to be performed on self.
Finally, there was a significant three-way interaction
between the target, sex, and the type of sexual play (F[1,
761] = 30.70, p < .001, ηp
2 = .039), suggesting that the interac-
tion between target and sex took different forms depending on
the type of sexual play. This interaction can be seen in Fig.1.
When we moved from men to women, the desire for aggres-
sive sexual play to be performed on self did not change, but
for humiliating sexual play it declined. As a consequence, the
interaction between target and sex was more pronounced for
aggressive than for humiliating sexual play. Thus, the differ-
ences between what each sex desired to perform on a partner
and a partner to perform on self were more pronounced for
aggressive sexual play than for humiliating sexual play.
Discordance intheInterest forAggressive andHumiliating
Sexual Play
In Fig.1, we can see also that there was discordance between
the sexes, as men indicated a stronger desire for aggressive
and humiliating sexual play to perform on partners than
women would desire their partners to perform on them.
Furthermore, the slopes of the lines indicated that men and
women would disagree more over humiliating than over
aggressive sexual play. In order to investigate the discordance
further, we performed a MANOVA, where sexual play acts
were entered as the dependent variables, and the discordance
variable (two levels: women desire to be performed on self/
men desire to perform on partner) was entered as the inde-
pendent variable. We performed this analysis twice, once for
aggressive sexual play and once for humiliating sexual play.
The results are shown in Table6.
Starting from aggressive sexual play, we can see that there
was a significant discordance, with the overall effect size to
be moderate. This difference was found for all acts with the
exception of the “Looks at me aggressively,” where no sig-
nificant sex difference was found. As indicated by the effect
size, the strongest discordance was for the “Does things to me
without asking” and for “Slaps me.” With respect to humiliat-
ing sexual play, a significant sex difference was also found,
Table 5 Sex differences in fantasies for aggressive and humiliating sexual play
On self On partner
Total Men Women p value dTotal Men Women p value d
M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD)
Aggressive sexual play
Overall 2.40 (1.03) 2.35 (10.1) 2.44 (1.05) < .001 .09 2.48 (1.09) 2.79 (1.15) 2.25 (0.98) < .001 .51
Ties me 2.45 (1.44) 2.43 (1.44) 2.49 (1.45) .953 .05 2.51 (1.44) 2.82 (1.51) 2.31 (1.35) < .001 .36
Handcuffs me 2.40 (1.43) 2.39 (1.45) 2.46 (1.42) .943 .05 2.48 (1.45) 2.76 (1.53) 2.29 (1.36) < .001 .32
Pulls my hair 2.43 (1.44) 2.14 (1.33) 2.67 (1.48) < .001 .38 2.68 (1.48) 3.12 (1.48) 2.36 (1.40) < .001 .53
Bites me 2.56 (1.41) 2.54 (1.38) 2.59 (1.43) .496 .03 2.75 (1.45) 2.89 (1.45) 2.69 (1.42) .005 .14
Slaps me 1.88 (1.23) 1.85 (1.21) 1.92 (1.27) .809 .05 2.06 (1.30) 2.61 (1.49) 1.63 (1) < .001 .77
Treats me aggressively 2.45 (1.41) 2.56 (1.40) 2.42 (1.42) .049 .10 2.46 (1.45) 2.81 (1.50) 2.20 (1.35) < .001 .43
Looks at me aggressively 2.71 (1.51) 2.69 (1.50) 2.73 (1.49) .497 .03 2.64 (1.48) 2.80 (1.49) 2.54 (1.54) < .001 .17
Hits me 1.77 (1.14) 1.77 (1.13) 1.78 (1.15) .726 .00 1.84 (1.23) 2.33 (1.44) 1.48 (0.90) < .001 .63
Does things to me without asking 2.95 (1.46) 3.18 (1.47) 2.81 (1.42) < .001 .26 3.02 (1.49) 3.36 (1.49) 2.73 (1.42) < .001 .43
Humiliating sexual play
Total 1.73 (0.86) 1.88 (0.96) 1.62 (0.76) < .001 .30 1.83 (0.99) 2.21 (1.17) 1.52 (0.69) < .001 .72
Swears at me 1.75 (1.19) 1.99 (1.35) 1.59 (1.05) < .001 .33 1.86 (1.28) 2.35 (1.49) 1.49 (0.95) < .001 .69
Humiliates me 1.35 (0.88) 1.45 (0.99) 1.28 (0.80) .011 .19 1.51 (1.08) 1.92 (1.37) 1.20 (0.64) < .001 .67
Spits on me 1.32 (0.85) 1.47 (1) 1.19 (0.66) < .001 .33 1.44 (0.99) 1.73 (1.23) 1.20 (0.66) < .001 .54
Talks dirty to me 2.51 (1.47) 2.68 (1.53) 2.43 (1.41) .042 .17 2.49 (1.47) 2.89 (1.54) 2.22 (1.36) < .001 .46

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
with the effect size being moderate but larger than the effect
size for aggressive sexual play. With respect to individual
acts, as indicated by the effect sizes, the biggest discordance
was for the “Humiliates me” act.
Furthermore, we would like to estimate the difference
between the level of desire of men to perform such acts on
partner and the level of women’s willingness to allow their
partners to perform such acts on them. For this purpose, we
performed a MANOVA, where the aggressive acts were
entered as the dependent variables, and the effective discord-
ance (two levels: women willing to allow a partner to perform
on self/men desire to perform on partner) was entered as the
independent variable. Such analysis was also performed for
the humiliating sexual play. As can be seen from Table6,
with respect to aggressive sexual play, there was still signifi-
cant discordance, but the effect size was about half as much
as in the previous analysis, indicating a substantial decrease
in discordance. Note also that, for several acts, no significant
effect was found. With respect to humiliating sexual play,
however, there was only a small reduction in the effect size.
In Fig.1, we can see further that men indicated a stronger
desire for aggressive and humiliating sexual play to be per-
formed on them than women would desire to perform on
their partners. In order to investigate this discordance, we
performed a MANOVA, where sexual play acts were entered
as the dependent variables and the discordance variable (two
levels: men desire to be performed on self/women desire to
perform on partner) was entered as the independent variable.
With respect to aggressive sexual play, the result indicated
a significant small to moderate discordance (Table6). As
indicated by the effect size, the strongest discordance was for
the “Does things to me without asking” and for “Hits me.”
Finally, there was a significant large discordance with respect
to humiliating sexual play. As indicated by the effect size,
the discordance was the highest for the “Talks dirty to me.”
Discussion
The results of the current research indicated that the desire for
aggressive and humiliating sexual play was high, with more
than 70% of participants exhibiting a desire for at least one
aggressive or humiliating sexual act, and about half of the
participants exhibiting a desire for at least three acts. Aggres-
sive sexual play was desired more than humiliating sexual
play, while there was variation in the desire for each act in
each category, with some acts being desired more than others.
In addition, there was discordance between men and women,
with men desiring to engage in aggressive and humiliating
sexual play more than women. Effective discordance was
likely to be lower, however, as women were willing to allow
their partners to perform on them aggressive and humiliating
sexual acts in order to satisfy them.
With respect to the observed sex differences, given the
large sample size, even small differences would be signifi-
cant, so the effect sizes can give us a better picture of how
extensively the two sexes differed in each dimension. With
respect to aggressive sexual play to be performed on partner,
Fig. 1 The figures depict the three-way interaction between type of sexual play, target, and sex

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
Table 6 Disagreement between the sexes over the desire for aggressive and humiliating sexual play
Men on partner Women on self p value dMen on partner Women allow on self p value dWomen on partner Men on self p value d
M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD) M. (SD)
Aggressive sexual play
Overall 2.92 (0.89) 2.52 (0.89) < .001 .45 2.92 (0.89) 2.71 (1.07) < .001 .21 2.31 (0.84) 2.59 (0.89) < .001 .32
Ties me 2.85 (1.43) 2.34 (1.24) < .001 .38 2.85 (1.43) 2.86 (1.45) .596 .00 2.31 (1.32) 2.47 (1.34) .163 .12
Handcuffs me 2.79 (1.49) 2.34 (1.24) < .001 .33 2.79 (1.49) 2.85 (1.47) .200 .04 2.30 (1.29) 2.5 (1.37) .077 .15
Pulls my hair 3.28 (1.37) 2.90 (1.31) .001 .28 3.28 (1.37) 3.02 (1.46) .044 .18 2.47 (1.34) 2.42 (1.3) .258 .04
Bites me 3.13 (1.33) 2.88 (1.2) .010 .20 3.13 (1.33) 2.93 (1.42) .064 .14 2.94 (1.33) 3.05 (1.29) .562 .08
Slaps me 2.73 (1.46) 2.09 (1.25) < .001 .47 2.73 (1.46) 2.11 (1.33) < .001 .44 1.58 (0.99) 2.05 (1.22) < .001 .42
Treats me aggressively 2.86 (1.42) 2.47 (1.27) < .001 .29 2.86 (1.42) 2.56 (1.46) .003 .21 2.14 (1.24) 2.61 (1.32) < .001 .37
Looks at me aggressively 2.95 (1.44) 2.92 (1.42) .843 .02 2.95 (1.44) 3.17 (1.49) .009 .15 2.61 (1.4) 3.06 (1.43) < .001 .32
Hits me 2.38 (1.38) 1.95 (1.18) < .001 .33 2.38 (1.38) 1.89 (1.25) < .001 .37 1.46 (0.86) 1.91 (1.15) < .001 .44
Does things to me without asking 3.54 (1.31) 2.81 (1.35) < .001 .55 3.54 (1.31) 2.96 (1.42) < .001 .42 2.88 (1.39) 3.48 (1.27) < .001 .45
Humiliating sexual play
Total 2.22 (1.12) 1.69 (0.64) < .001 .58 2.22 (1.12) 1.80 (0.82) < .001 .43 1.46 (0.56) 2.11 (0.9) < .001 .87
Swears at me 2.31 (1.46) 1.62 (0.98) < .001 .55 2.31 (1.46) 1.80 (1.21) < .001 .38 1.34 (0.74) 2.16 (1.3) < .001 .77
Humiliates me 1.83 (1.31) 1.25 (0.67) < .001 .56 1.83 (1.31) 1.32 (0.79) < .001 .47 1.13 (0.51) 1.51 (1) < .001 .48
Spits on me 1.71 (1.24) 1.18 (0.59) < .001 .54 1.71 (1.24) 1.28 (0.76) < .001 .42 1.14 (0.52) 1.50 (1) < .001 .45
Talks dirty to me 3.06 (1.48) 2.68 (1.28) < .001 .27 3.06 (1.48) 2.77 (1.47) .002 .20 2.25 (1.28) 3.28 (1.37) < .001 .78

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
the effect size was large, with men preferring it consider-
ably more than women. On the other hand, for the aggressive
sexual play to be performed on self, the small effect size
connoted substantial overlap in desire between the two sexes.
Moving on to the humiliating sexual play to be performed on
partner, the effect size indicated a considerable difference,
with men preferring it much more than women. With respect
to humiliating sexual play to be performed on self, men pre-
ferred it also more than women, but as indicated by the effect
size, the sex difference was moderate. Similar patterns were
found for sexual fantasies. Overall, men preferred more than
women to engage in aggressive and humiliating sexual play,
but the difference was considerably more pronounced over
performing it on partner than over performing it on self.
The occurrence rates found here were much higher than
the rates found in other studies, which did not measure desires
for individual acts, and they also examined desires for aggres-
sive and humiliating sexual play as a paraphilia (e.g., Daw-
son etal., 2016; Joyal & Carpentier, 2017). Our theoretical
framework, combined with these high occurrence rates, sug-
gests that aggressive and humiliating sexual play constitutes
a normal and not a deviant expression of human sexuality.
It needs to be said, nevertheless, that if desires for aggres-
sive and humiliating sexual acts become rigid and extreme,
resulting in physical harm, or preventing an individual to
have satisfactory sexual intercourse without engaging in such
play, a diagnosis of paraphilic disorder may apply (American
Psychiatric Association, 2013).
Our findings indicate further that this kind of sexual play
can be a potential source of discordance in couples. Men
would desire to engage in aggressive and humiliating sexual
play more than their opposite-sex partners would like. The
mismatch in desires may not necessarily escalate to sub-
stantial discordance, given that individuals exhibited a will-
ingness to allow their partners to perform aggressive and
humiliating sexual acts on them in order to satisfy them. We
would also expect this discordance to be reduced further,
since individuals would be similarly willing to perform such
acts on their partner even if they do not prefer to do so, in
order to provide them satisfaction. Future studies need to
examine whether this is the case.
The present study has attempted to place the preference
for aggressive and humiliating sexual play in an evolutionary
framework. It has been argued that male desires for aggres-
sive and humiliating sexual play have been shaped by selec-
tion forces in ancestral pre-industrial times, to enable men to
bypass female choice and place female sexuality under con-
trol. As such dispositions do not serve the interests of women,
they would not find them as desirable as men, but they would
find them to some degree desirable in order to reduce conflict
with their partners. It needs to be said that there is no paradox
in the argument that women have evolved desires to accom-
modate the desires of their partners, which have evolved in
the first place to promote the interests of men against the
interests of women. More specifically, it appears as if we are
saying that women have evolved desires to accommodate the
desires of their partners, the latter being fitness-decreasing
for women. But it needs to be considered that by accommo-
dating their partners’ desires, women increase rather than
decrease their fitness. To state it differently, although these
male desires are fitness-decreasing for women, the latter
detesting them would be even more fitness-decreasing for
them.
In this framework, these desires are interpreted as innate
dispositions, but such dispositions are also likely to be
responsive to environmental conditions. More specifically, in
a conservative social context, individuals may be less likely
to express and act on such desires than in a less conserva-
tive social context. Also, social phenomena such as the high
popularity of literature works (e.g., Fifty Shades of Gray),
can turn people more open to sexual play of this kind (Alten-
burger, Carotta, Bonomi, & Snyder, 2017; Peter & Valken-
burg, 2006). Moreover, the presence of individual rights pro-
tection systems are likely to affect the degree that individuals
act on their desires irrespectively of their partners’ will. For
instance, in a pre-industrial context, where individual rights
are not well protected, men have more freedom to act on
their preferences, but such freedom is much more limited in
a post-industrial context.
One advantage of this research is that it was online, which
gives privacy to individuals who are more likely to give
honest answers, especially for a sensitive subject (Kreuter
etal., 2008; Link & Mokdad, 2005). On the other hand, the
sample obtained by this method was not representative of
the population. In particular, people who are younger, more
educated, and more open-minded are likely to be overrep-
resented (Ross, Månsson, Daneback, Cooper, & Tikkanen,
2005). Also, individuals who agree to participate in sex
studies are more open and more sexually experienced than
non-respondents (Bogaert, 1996; Wiederman, 1999). These
biases would tend to inflate the occurrence rates of aggressive
and humiliating sexual play. Furthermore, this is a self-report
study and, given its nature, individuals may not be willing to
admit that they have desires for aggressive and humiliating
sexual play which would deflate the occurrence rates.
In addition, part of the observed sex differences in desire
for aggressive and humiliating sexual play may be due to a
greater willingness of men to acknowledge sexual interest
and fantasy. Accordingly, future research needs to control
for such an effect in order to estimate more accurately the
sex differences arising from evolved predispositions. Also,
our instrument was developed on the basis of qualitative
research on the acts that people indicated as aggressive
and humiliating. Even so, not all participants in our sample
may have interpreted these acts in this way. For instance,
“Does things to me without asking” can be interpreted as

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
an aggressive act because it bypasses the consent of the
recipient. Yet, some participants might endorse this act
because they interpreted it to involve their partner kissing
or caressing them without asking first, actions which are
usually not considered as aggressive. Similarly, for “Talks
dirty to me,” some dirty talking may not be interpreted as
humiliating for the recipient (e.g., “you have a beautiful
pussy”). Overall, some participants may not have consid-
ered certain acts as aggressive and humiliating which may
have inflated their willingness to report them as desirable.
Moreover, some participants may lacked experience and
may not have adequately explored their sexuality, so they may
actually have had such preferences without being aware of
it. The reverse may happen as well, since people may have
thought that such play was entertaining, without, however,
having engaged in it, and if they do so they may change their
minds. Future research can potentially control for such effects
by measuring how sexual experienced participants are. Fur-
thermore, in constructing the instrument of our study, we did
not include items which participants reported infrequently
as desirable. Future research can construct a more compre-
hensive instrument for measuring desires for aggressive
and humiliating sexual play. Last but not least, the present
research is confined to a single culture; as cultural factors
are likely to affect the occurrence rates, our findings may
not readily apply to different cultures. Future studies need to
replicate these findings in different cultural settings.
Acknowledgements We would like to thank Georgia Kapitsaki and
three anonymous reviewers for their constructive feedback which ena-
bled us to improve our work.
References
Altenburger, L. E., Carotta, C. L., Bonomi, A. E., & Snyder, A.
(2017). Sexist attitudes among emerging adult women readers of
Fifty Shades fiction. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 46, 455–464.
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical
manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). Arlington, VA: American
Psychiatric Publishing.
Andersson, M. (1994). Sexual selection. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
University Press.
Apostolou, M. (2012). Sexual selection under parental choice: Evi-
dence from sixteen historical societies. Evolutionary Psychol-
ogy, 10, 504–518.
Apostolou, M. (2014). Sexual selection under parental choice: The
evolution of human mating behaviour. Hove, UK: Psychology
Press.
Apostolou, M. (2015). Parent-offspring conflict over mating: Domains
of agreement and disagreement. Evolutionary Psychology, 13.
Retrieved from http://evp.sagep ub.com/conte nt/13/3/14747
04915 60456 1.full.pdf+html.
Bogaert, A. F. (1996). Volunteer bias in human sexuality research:
Evidence for both sexuality and personality differences in males.
Archives of Sexual Behavior, 25, 125–140.
Buss, D. M. (2017). The evolution of desire: Strategies of human
mating (4th ed.). New York: Basic Books.
Buunk, A. P., Park, J. H., & Dubbs, S. L. (2008). Parent-offspring
conflict in mate preferences. Review of General Psychology, 12,
47–62.
Dawson, S. J., Bannerman, B. A., & Lalumière, M. L. (2016). Para-
philic interests: An examination of sex differences in a nonclini-
cal sample. Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Treatment and Research,
28, 20–45.
Goetz, A. T., Shackelford, T. K., Romero, G. A., Kaighobadi, F., &
Miner, E. J. (2008). Punishment, proprietariness, and paternity:
Men’s violence against women from an evolutionary perspective.
Aggression and Violent Behavior, 13, 481–489.
Holmes, S. T., & Holmes, R. M. (2008). Sex crimes: Patterns and
behavior (3rd ed.). New York: Sage.
Janus, S. S., & Janus, C. L. (1993). The Janus report on sexual behav-
ior. New York: John Wiley.
Joyal, C. C., & Carpentier, J. (2017). The prevalence of paraphilic
interests and behaviors in the general population: A provincial
survey. Journal of Sex Research, 54, 161–171.
Joyal, C. C., Cossette, A., & Lapierre, V. (2015). What exactly is
an unusual sexual fantasy? Journal of Sexual Medicine, 12,
328–340.
Kinsey, A. C., Pomeroy, W. B., & Martin, C. E. (1948). Sexual behav-
ior in the human male. Philadelphia, PA: Saunders.
Kinsey, A. C., Pomeroy, W. B., Martin, C. E., & Gebhard, P. H.
(1953). Sexual behavior in the human female. Philadelphia, PA:
Saunders.
Kreuter, F., Presser, S., & Tourangeau, R. (2008). Social desirability
bias in CATI, IVR, and Web surveys: The effects of mode and
question sensitivity. Public Opinion Quarterly, 72, 847–865.
Långström, N., & Hanson, R. K. (2006). High rates of sexual behavior
in the general population: Correlates and predictors. Archives of
Sexual Behavior, 35, 37–52.
Leitenberg, H., & Henning, K. (1995). Sexual fantasy. Psychological
Bulletin, 117, 469–496.
Link, M. W., & Mokdad, A. H. (2005). Effects of survey mode on
selfreports of adult alcohol consumption: A comparison of mail,
web, and telephone approaches. Journal of Studies on Alcohol,
66, 239–245.
Oliveira, W. M. D., & Abdo, C. H. N. (2010). Unconventional sexual
behaviors and their associations with physical, mental and sexual
health parameters: A study in 18 large Brazilian cities. Revista
Brasileira de Psiquiatria, 32, 264–274.
Perilloux, C., Fleischman, D. S., & Buss, D. M. (2011). Meet the par-
ents: Parent-offspring convergence and divergence in mate pref-
erences. Personality and Individual Differences, 50, 253–258.
Peter, J., & Valkenburg, P. M. (2006). Adolescents’ exposure to sexu-
ally explicit online material and recreational attitudes toward
sex. Journal of Communication, 56, 639–660.
Puts, D. A. (2010). Beauty and the beast: Mechanisms of sexual selec-
tion in humans. Evolution and Human Behavior, 31, 157–175.
Puts, D. A. (2016). Human sexual selection. Current Opinion in Psy-
chology, 7, 28–32.
Quinsey, V. L. (2012). Pragmatic and Darwinian views of the para-
philias. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 41, 217–220.
Ross, M. W., Månsson, S. A., Daneback, K., Cooper, A., & Tikkanen,
R. (2005). Biases in internet sexual health samples: Compari-
son of an internet sexuality survey and a national sexual health
survey in Sweden. Social Science and Medicine, 61, 245–252.
Rozée-Koker, P. D. (1987). Cross-cultural codes on seven types of
rape. Cross-Cultural Research, 21, 101–117.
Sanday, P. R. (1981). Female power and male dominance: On the
origins of sexual inequality. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press.

Archives of Sexual Behavior
1 3
Strassberg, D. S., & Lockerd, L. K. (1998). Force in women’s sexual
fantasies. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 27, 403–414.
Sugiyama, M. S. (2014). Fitness costs of warfare for women. Human
Nature, 25, 476–495.
Thornhill, R., & Palmer, C. T. (2000). A natural history of rape:
Biological bases of sexual coercion. Cambridge, MA: The MIT
Press.
Travis, C. B. (2003). An unnatural history of rape. Cambridge, MA:
The MIT Press.
Trivers, R. L. (1972). Parental investment and sexual selection. In B.
Campbell (Ed.), Sexual selection and the descent of man: 1871–
1971 (pp. 136–179). Chicago: Aldine.
Wiederman, M. W. (1999). Volunteer bias in sexuality research using
college student participants. Journal of Sex Research, 36, 59–66.