Gender effects of romantic themes in erotica

The hypothesis that women would be more aroused to explicit erotica containing a romantic (rather than nonromantic) theme while men would not be affected by the thematic manipulation was tested, 164 college students (91 male and 73 female), 21 years of age and older, viewed one of four video vignettes taken from commercially available sexually explicit video tapes. The four videos represented the systematic manipulation of two independent variables: (i) high vs. low expression of love and affection (e.g, kissing, nongenital touching, and verbal expressions of caring); and (ii) high vs. moderate sexual explicitness (i.e., "hard" vs. "soft" X-rated material). The results indicated that both male and female subjects rated the high explicit/high romantic vignette as significantly more arousing than the high explicit/low romantic vignette. Thus, the finding for males was contrary to expectations. The results are, however, consistent with the recent movement to romanticize highly explicit sexual material. Theoretical implications of these findings are examined.