PEEPERS: MASTURBATION
The peepers display but one salient feature with regard to the incidence of postpubertal masturbation; the unmarried males rank high in the percentages for certain age-periods. For instance, in age-period 16-20 some 96 per cent had masturbated, and in the following age-period 92 per cent. We know that masturbation accompanied their peeping in many instances. In age-period 26-30 they drop to fifth place (with 87 per cent) as they begin to leave their peeping days behind them. They rank second in the percentage (17 per cent) who had ever in one week masturbated over a dozen times, but the average maximum is neither high nor low.
Their frequencies of premarital masturbation are, by and large, not unusual, and ordinarily put them in intermediate positions in the frequency rank-orders in the various age-periods. In general their frequencies exceed those of the control group, and the same may be said for the mean frequencies. Too few married peepers are in our sample to allow meaningful calculation of their masturbation frequencies.
In most groups there is a continued decrease among the single males in the age-periods from puberty to twenty-five in the proportion of total outlet derived from masturbation. Among the single peepers, however, the proportions at age-periods 16—20 and 21-25 are essentially identical; the customary decrease has been temporarily checked at a 60 per cent level. This percentage earns them fifth rank in age-period 16-20, but in age-period 21-25 it puts them in second place. This same sort of pattern, also at the same levels, is seen in the exhibitionists, and suggests a retardation in sociosexual (and especially heterosexual) adjustment. Since masturbation frequently accompanies both peeping and exhibition, one may consider this another reason for the similarity between the two groups. However, one cannot say that the offense modus operandi wholly explain why the masturbatory proportion remains undiminished in age-period 21—25, because the average exhibitionist was first convicted for exhibition during age-period 26—30, when the proportion of total outlet derived from masturbation falls substantially for both exhibitionists and peepers.
The peepers’ masturbatory fantasies are rather peculiar. They rank third (8 per cent) in sadomasochistic fantasy, first (11 per cent) in fantasy of animal contacts, and second (22 per cent) in bizarre fantasy. In brief, while basically heterosexual, they are relatively predisposed to the more exotic forms of fantasy. Their high standing, below only two aggressor groups, in the sadomasochistic category is surprising, since peepers are ordinarily regarded as rather timid souls averse to violence. However, our sample of peepers includes a minority of aggressive individuals who doubtless are responsible for most of the sadistic fantasies.
Peepers share with the incest offenders vs. adults the unhappy distinction of having worried over masturbation more than any other group. Some/58 per cent of the years in which their masturbation occurred were also years in which they worried about it. One is tempted to speculate that their guilt or apprehension regarding peeping, an activity commonly accompanied or immediately followed by masturbation, may have colored their attitude toward masturbation. In this connection it is of interest that the exhibitionists, whose offense behavior also often incorporates masturbation, occupy second place in the rank-order of worriers.
The majority of peepers learned of masturbation through talking or reading and observation (44 per cent, fifth in rank-order). An average number learned by being masturbated by another person and relatively few discovered it for themselves. The; number who learned visually is all the more interesting when one recalls that the peepers had only an average amount of prepubertal sex play—yet more of them learned of masturbation by observation than did the members of groups characterized by much more extensive prepubertal sexual experience. This acquisition of knowledge by observation does not seem to have led the peepers to any unusual amount of pre- or postpubertal masturbation, which is in keeping with the general tendency of the peeper to watch rather than to do.
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