Explain the factors that contribute to sexual orientation.
What will be an ideal response?
Despite the difficulties in studying issues of sexual orientation, researchers continue to work on refining its sources. They have determined four potential sources of its structure to be genetic, prenatal, postnatal, and interactive biopsychosocial.
Some combination of these sources may one day lead to the origin of sexual orientation and how attraction and sexual behavior are consistent or changing.
Genetic Sources: Genes are fixed at conception and influence fetal development. This influence is believed to continue throughout a person's lifetime regardless of the culture in which the individual grows up.
Prenatal Sources: Researchers of prenatal sources of sexual orientation typically consider two factors. The first is hormones. They look for a patterned link between a hormonal trait in the mother's biology and the expression of sexual orientation in her offspring.
Postnatal Sources: Imprinting is an early learning process when newborns establish a behavior pattern of recognition and attraction to another animal of its own kind or to an object identified as the parent. Researchers consider imprinting as one of the major behavioral and cognitive mechanisms that may influence sexual orientation. It is akin to exposure to human touch, love, or neglect as well as the ability to bond or attach to people.
Interactive Biopsychosocial Sources: This is a more comprehensive explanation of sexual orientation than the first three. The interactive biopsychosocial approach suggests that, starting in early life, biological, psychological, and social factors interact to produce sexual attractions and sexual orientation.
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a. Hormone replacement therapy c. Rejuvenation therapy b. Exercise d. Increased relaxation
Studies suggest that children choose gender-traditional toys by the age of ____
a. nine months c. two years b. eighteen months d. three years
Which statement would a proponent of the "anti-censorship" movement of pornography most likely make?
a. If we restrict the publication and distribution of pornographic material, what will be next? b. Pornography on TV should be available to everyone, not only those who can afford to pay for it. c. Pornography is a natural extension of our sexuality and allowing censorship of it could impact a person's psychological well being. d. The publication and restriction of pornography should be treated as any other type of material and it is the sole responsibility of the parents, not the government, to censor it for their children.
Rosie volunteers to complete a sex survey for Ivan, a doctoral student working on his dissertation. One of the questions refers to the number of times the respondent has had unprotected sexual intercourse. Rosie marks "less than two times" even though she knows the number is higher. This is an example of
A. enlargement. B. concealment. C. volunteer bias. D. a problem with estimation.