Havelock Ellis (1859-1939), another important sex researcher, was an English citizen who grew up in Victorian society but began to rebel against the secrecy surrounding sex­uality. In 1875, when he was 16 years old, he decided to make sexuality his life’s work. In fact, it is reported that Ellis sought a medical degree primarily so […]

Richard von Krafft-Ebing (1840-1902) was one of the most significant medical writers on sexology in the late 19th century (V. Bullough, 1994). His primary interest was what he considered “deviant” sexual behavior. Krafft-Ebing believed that deviant sexual be­havior was the result of engaging in nonreproductive sexual practices, including mas­turbation. In 1886, he published an update […]

Albert Moll (1862-1939), a Berlin physician, was another big promoter of sexology. He was a very conservative man who disliked both Freud and Hirschfeld and tried to counter their research at every opportunity. Moll formed the International Society for Sex Research in 1913 to counter Hirschfeld’s Medical Society of Sexology. He also or­ganized an International […]

Iwan Bloch (1872-1922), a Berlin dermatologist, believed that the medical view of sex­ual behavior was shortsighted and that both historical and anthropological research could help broaden it. He hoped that sexual science would one day have the same struc­ture and objectivity as other sciences. Along with Magnus Hirschfeld, Bloch and several other physicians formed a […]

Of all these researchers, the most influential early promoters of sexology were Iwan Bloch, Albert Moll, Magnus Hirschfeld, and Richard von Krafft-Ebing. All four were German and were working around the turn of the 20th century. Another researcher, Havelock Ellis, was working in London to establish the field of sexology. Early Promoters of Sexology Several […]

In the late 1980s and early 1990s there was an unprecedented surge in sexuality research, predominantly driven by concerns over human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and ac­quired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS). Researchers were anxious to understand more about specific sexual behaviors that might contribute to the spread of these dis­eases. In fact, since this time, the […]

The ancient Greeks, through physicians like Hippocrates and philosophers such as Aristotle and Plato, may actually be the legitimate forefathers of sex research, because they were the first to elaborate theories regarding sexual responses and dysfunctions, sex legislation, reproduction and contraception, and sexual ethics. But it wasn’t until the 18th century that there was increased […]

  ecause theorists from different perspectives are interested in different types of studies, they ask different types of questions. Following are a few questions that theorists from different schools of thought might ask. Psychoanalytic: How are sexual problems later in life re­lated to early childhood experiences? How do children re­solve the Oedipal and Electra complexes? […]