MARRIAGE: PROPORTION OF TOTAL OUTLET
The interesting aspect of marital coitus (and petting to orgasm in marriage) is not that it provides the greatest part of the total sexual outlet of married men, but that it provides less than most people would anticipate. The members of most of our groups derive 85 per cent or more of their outlet from marital sexual activity; the remaining 15 per cent is easily accounted for by masturbation when the man’s wife is unavailable, an occasional orgasm during sleep, and a varying amount of opportunistic adultery.
By and large, the proportions of total outlet constituted by marital coitus remain remarkably stable throughout life. For example, between ages sixteen and fifty-five there is a variation of only five percentage points in the control group (the range being 88 to 93 per cent) and eight in the prison group. Large variation is seen only among a few groups, and in these cases is usually explicable. Among the homosexual offenders vs. adults, heterosexuality was weak enough to be periodically seriously diminished by homosexuality and masturbation with homosexual fantasy. Among the exhibitionists, spells of exhibition with masturbation plus solitary masturbation caused the large variation.
Trends are not easily observed and one must beware of those caused by our methods. For instance, the trend of the prison group to derive progressively more of their outlet from marital activity seems to be factually accurate—it reflects a “settling down” phenomenon which we have previously noted among males of the lower socioeconomic level. One might say that departure from a “settling down” pattern or from a stable pattern is indicative of marital discord and/or sex-offense behavior.
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