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Updated: May 24, 2026

Assessment of Sexual Behavior of Male Mice
Published on: March 5, 2020
Implicit motives and sexual conservatism as predictors of sexual behaviors
1Department of Psychology, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA. zurbrigg@ucsc.edu
Abstract:
This study was designed to provide an assessment of the relationship between the two most important implicit motives and the most frequently studied sexual behaviors. A community sample of 102 men and 92 women completed measures of implicit power and affiliation-intimacy motives, sexual conservatism, social desirability, and sexual behavior. For men, high power motivation was positively associated with the number of sexual partners and the frequency of sex. There was an interaction between sexual conservatism and power motivation in women. For women low in sexual conservatism, high power motivation was positively associated with the number of sexual partners and with earlier initiation to intercourse and oral sex. There were few associations between affiliation-intimacy motivation and sexual behaviors; however, women high in this motive reported later initiation to oral sex.
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