| Discipline | Clinical Psychiatry |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Edited by | Kenneth J. Zucker |
| Publication details | |
| History | 1971–present |
| Publisher | |
| Frequency | Bimonthly |
| Hybrid | |
| 4.507 (2020) | |
| Standard abbreviations | |
| ISO 4 | Arch. Sex. Behav. |
| Indexing | |
| CODEN | ASXBA |
| ISSN | 0004-0002 (print) 1573-2800 (web) |
| LCCN | 71648996 |
| OCLC no. | 1183760 |
| Links | |
The Archives of Sexual Behavior is a peer-reviewed academic journal in sexology. It is the official publication of the International Academy of Sex Research.
The journal was established in 1971 by Richard Green, who served as its editor-in-chief until 2001. [1] He was succeeded by Kenneth J. Zucker. [1] It is published by Springer Science+Business Media [2] and has become a leading journal in its field. [3] [ when? ]
Archives of Sexual Behavior is abstracted and indexed in Biological Abstracts, Current Contents/Social & Behavioral Sciences, EMBASE, Family & Society Studies Worldwide, Health and Safety Science Abstracts, Index Medicus/MEDLINE, Psychological Abstracts, PsycINFO, Referativny Zhurnal, Risk Abstracts, Sage Family Studies Abstracts, Scopus, Sexual and Relations Therapy, Social Sciences Citation Index, Social Science Index, Sociological Abstracts, Studies on Women & Gender Abstracts, and Violence and Abuse Abstracts. [2] According to the Journal Citation Reports , the journal's 2020 impact factor is 4.507. [4]
In 2003, a paper by Robert Spitzer was published (outside "the usual peer-review process" [5] [6] ) in the Archives of Sexual Behavior. This was based on 200 self-selected phone interviews, [7] including some with members of the ex-gay movement who self-reported that conversion therapy (a.k.a. "reparative therapy") changed their sexual orientation. [8] [5] The paper concluded: "There is evidence that change in sexual orientation following some form of reparative therapy does occur in some gay men and lesbians." [7] [9] Before publication, the paper was presented at a psychiatry conference in 2001, [5] after which it "generated enormous public attention and controversy". [7] The journal published the paper alongside critical commentaries, including one saying conversion therapy violates ethics as defined by the Nuremberg Code. [5] Spitzer's paper became cited by political activists opposed to homosexuality, and the ex-gay movement. [7] [6] [5] Spitzer later agreed with critics of his paper's methodology, calling them "largely correct". [5] [8] In 2012, he asked the journal's editor (Kenneth Zucker) to retract it. [5] [8] [10] Zucker declined to retract the paper. [8] [10] A letter to the editor by Spitzer later appeared in the journal on the matter. [11] [7] [9]
In May 2023, an open letter, signed by a hundred researchers who had previously published in the Archives of Sexual behavior, accused the journal of editorial bias against the LGBTQ community. The letter also garnered support from five professional groups specializing in the study of LGBTQ people. The letter cited a number of articles published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior which they described as having poor research ethics and which failed to declare their financial ties to anti-LGBTQ political groups. Signatories of the letter declared that they "will no longer submit to the journal, act as peer reviewers, or serve in an editorial capacity until Dr Zucker is replaced with an editor who has a demonstrated record of integrity on LGBTQ+ matters and, especially, trans matters". [12] [ third-party source needed ]
Conversion therapy is the pseudoscientific practice of attempting to change an individual's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to align with heterosexual and cisgender norms. Methods that have been used to this end include forms of brain surgery, surgical or hormonal castration, aversive treatments such as electric shocks, nausea-inducing drugs, hypnosis, counseling, spiritual interventions, visualization, psychoanalysis, and arousal reconditioning.
The Alliance for Therapeutic Choice and Scientific Integrity (ATCSI), which until 2014 was known as the National Association for Research & Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH), also known as the NARTH Institute, is a US organization that promotes conversion therapy, a pseudoscientific practice used in attempts to change the sexual orientation of people with same-sex attraction. NARTH was founded in 1992 by Joseph Nicolosi, Benjamin Kaufman, and Charles Socarides. Its headquarters were in Encino, California, at its Thomas Aquinas Psychological Clinic. NARTH has not been recognized by any major United States-based professional association.
The field of psychology has extensively studied homosexuality as a human sexual orientation. The American Psychiatric Association listed homosexuality in the DSM-I in 1952 as a "sociopathic personality disturbance," but that classification came under scrutiny in research funded by the National Institute of Mental Health. That research and subsequent studies consistently failed to produce any empirical or scientific basis for regarding homosexuality as anything other than a natural and normal sexual orientation that is a healthy and positive expression of human sexuality. As a result of this scientific research, the American Psychiatric Association removed homosexuality from the DSM-II in 1973. Upon a thorough review of the scientific data, the American Psychological Association followed in 1975 and also called on all mental health professionals to take the lead in "removing the stigma of mental illness that has long been associated" with homosexuality. In 1993, the National Association of Social Workers adopted the same position as the American Psychiatric Association and the American Psychological Association, in recognition of scientific evidence. The World Health Organization, which listed homosexuality in the ICD-9 in 1977, removed homosexuality from the ICD-10 which was endorsed by the 43rd World Health Assembly on 17 May 1990.
The ex-gay movement consists of people and organizations that encourage people to refrain from entering or pursuing same-sex relationships, to eliminate homosexual desires and to develop heterosexual desires, or to enter into a heterosexual relationship. Beginning with the founding of Love In Action and Exodus International in the mid-1970s, the movement saw rapid growth in the 1980s and 1990s before declining in the 2000s.
Exodus International was a non-profit, interdenominational ex-gay Christian umbrella organization connecting organizations that sought to "help people who wished to limit their homosexual desires". Founded in 1976, Exodus International originally asserted that conversion therapy, the reorientation of same-sex attraction, was possible. In 2006, Exodus International had over 250 local ministries in the United States and Canada and over 150 ministries in 17 other countries. Although Exodus was formally an interdenominational Christian entity, it was most closely associated with Protestant and evangelical denominations.
Robert Leopold Spitzer was a psychiatrist and professor of psychiatry at Columbia University in New York City. He was a major force in the development of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).
Joseph Nicolosi was an American clinical psychologist who advocated and practised "reparative therapy", a form of the pseudoscientific treatment of conversion therapy that he claimed could help people overcome or mitigate their homosexual desires and replace them with heterosexual ones. Nicolosi was a founder and president of the National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH). Medical institutions warn that conversion therapy is ineffective and may be harmful, and that there is no evidence that sexual orientation can be changed by such treatments.
Ego-dystonic sexual orientation is a highly controversial mental health diagnosis that was included in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) from 1980 to 1987 and in the World Health Organization's (WHO) International Classification of Diseases (ICD) from 1990 to 2019. Individuals could be diagnosed with ego-dystonic sexual orientation if their sexual orientation or attractions were at odds with their idealized self-image, causing anxiety and a desire to change their orientation or become more comfortable with it. It describes not innate sexual orientation itself, but a conflict between the sexual orientation a person wishes to have and their actual sexual orientation.
Charles Silverstein was an American writer, therapist, and LGBT rights advocate. He was best known for his presentation as a graduate student before the American Psychiatric Association in 1973 that led to the removal of homosexuality as a mental illness from the organization's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. He was also the founding editor-in-chief of the Journal of Homosexuality.
Kenneth J. Zucker is an American-Canadian psychologist and sexologist. He was named editor-in-chief of Archives of Sexual Behavior in 2001. He was psychologist-in-chief at Toronto's Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) and head of its Gender Identity Service until December 2015. Zucker is a professor in the departments of psychiatry and psychology at the University of Toronto.
Jack Drescher is an American psychiatrist and psychoanalyst known for his work on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Sexual and Relationship Therapy is a peer-reviewed, scholarly journal offering a multidisciplinary forum for review and debate in the field of sex and relationship therapies. The journal presents original research and best practice and is a vehicle for new theory, methodology, and application. The focus of the journal is international and interdisciplinary in nature, with a range of contributions from diverse places on the globe, and myriad disciplines like sex therapy, sexual medicine, psychology, sexology, family therapy, public health, sociology, counselling, and medical ethics. It is the official journal of the College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists (COSRT). The journal was established in 1986 under the title Sexual and Marital Therapy, and under its current title since 2000. The editor-in-chief is Dr. Markie Twist.
James M. Cantor is an American-Canadian clinical psychologist and sexologist specializing in hypersexuality and paraphilias.
Homosexuality was classified as a mental disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) beginning with the first edition, published in 1952 by the American Psychiatric Association (APA). This classification was challenged by gay rights activists during the gay liberation following the 1969 Stonewall riots, and in December 1973, the APA board of trustees voted to declassify homosexuality as a mental disorder. In 1974, the DSM was updated and homosexuality was replaced with a new diagnostic code for individuals distressed by their homosexuality, termed ego-dystonic sexual orientation. Distress over one's sexual orientation remained in the manual, under different names, until the DSM-5 in 2013.
Students identifying as LGBTQIA+ have a long, documented history at Brigham Young University (BYU), and have experienced a range of treatment by other students and school administrators over the decades. Large surveys of over 7,000 BYU students in 2020 and 2017 found that over 13% had marked their sexual orientation as something other than "strictly heterosexual", while the other survey showed that .2% had reported their gender identity as transgender or something other than cisgender male or female. BYU is the largest religious university in North America and is the flagship institution of the educational system of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints —Mormonism's largest denomination.
In society at large, LGBT individuals, especially youth, are at a higher risk of depression, anxiety, and suicide. Though causes of mental health risk are complex, one often cited reason for these higher risks is minority stress stemming from societal anti-LGBT biases and stigma, rejection, and internalized homophobia.
Ferguson v. JONAH, New Jersey Superior Court No. L-5473-12 is a landmark LGBT civil rights case in which a New Jersey jury unanimously determined that conversion therapy, also called "reparative therapy," "reorientation therapy," or "ex-gay therapy" constituted consumer fraud.
Because of its ban against same-sex sexual activity and same-sex marriage the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has a long history of teaching that its adherents who are attracted to the same sex can and should attempt to alter their feelings through righteous striving and sexual orientation change efforts. Reparative therapy is the pseudoscientific practice of attempting to change an individual's sexual orientation from homosexual or bisexual to heterosexual, or their gender identity from transgender to cisgender using psychological, physical, or spiritual interventions. There is no reliable evidence that such practices can alter sexual orientation or gender identity, and many medical institutions warn that conversion therapy is ineffective and potentially harmful.
Many health organizations around the world have denounced and criticized sexual orientation and gender identity change efforts. National health organizations in the United States have announced that there has been no scientific demonstration of conversion therapy's efficacy in the last forty years. They find that conversion therapy is ineffective, risky and can be harmful. Anecdotal claims of cures are counterbalanced by assertions of harm, and the American Psychiatric Association, for example, cautions ethical practitioners under the Hippocratic oath to do no harm and to refrain from attempts at conversion therapy.
The history of conversion therapy can be divided broadly into three periods: an early Freudian period; a period of mainstream approval of conversion therapy, when the mental health establishment became the "primary superintendent" of sexuality; and a post-Stonewall period where the mainstream medical profession disavowed conversion therapy.
