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Sexuality is already present in infants and has its own characteristics in different age periods. Doctor and psychologist Igor Dobryakov talks about how the body, sensations, emotions and relationships change on the way to adult sexuality.
“Well, who did you give birth to?”
A person is born with well-defined signs of gender. So that there are no misunderstandings, immediately after the birth of the child, the midwife shows the newborn to the mother and draws her attention to the sex of the child: “Look, you have a girl” or “You have a boy!”. And every mother knows what to look at to make sure what was said is right. Usually, the sex of the child is not a surprise, since at a certain stage of pregnancy, women undergo an ultrasound examination (ultrasound), which makes it possible to judge how the intrauterine development of the fetus is going, and at the same time about the field of the unborn child.
The gender of the newborn is judged by primary sexual characteristics. Such signs are the external genital organs, which, unlike the internal ones, are not hidden in the abdominal cavity. The male external genital organs include the penis and the scrotum, which contains the male sex glands (testicles). The female external genital organs include: the vestibule (entrance) of the vagina, the large and small labia located around the entrance to the vagina, the clitoris and glands.
For a long time, external sexual differences were limited to this. Body changes begin in adolescence, when secondary sexual characteristics appear. They are not directly involved in the process of reproduction, but they play a big role in the emergence of interest in others in a teenager as a sexual partner. When the secondary sexual characteristics have finally taken shape, the bodies of girls and boys are almost indistinguishable from the bodies of adult women and men. In young men, such signs include facial hair (mustache and beard begin to grow), in the armpits and pubis, as well as a change in voice, which “breaks” and as a result becomes lower. In girls, secondary sexual characteristics are also manifested by hair growth, but only in the area of uXNUMXbuXNUMXbthe armpits and on the pubis, they are not on the face; growth and formation of mammary glands; change in the shape of the pelvis; the development of the subcutaneous fat layer according to the female type (the forms of the torso and hips are rounded).
Structure, feeling, fantasy
The genitals largely determine a person’s sexuality, but “sexual” and “sexual” are by no means synonymous. There is another important term – “erotic”. Manifestations of the sexual, sexual and erotic do not always coincide in time.
Sexual signs – anatomical and physiological features that distinguish girls from boys, boys from girls, women from men.
Sexuality – specific sensations and the positive emotions they cause, which arise when stimulating specific areas of the body, called erogenous zones. In all people, the main erogenous zones are the border areas of the transitions of the external skin to the internal mucous membranes, that is, all natural openings, as well as nipples, auricles, and the navel. According to the WHO definition, “sexuality is a central aspect of human being throughout life and includes sex, gender identities and roles, sexual orientation, sexual instinct, pleasure, intimacy and reproduction. Sexuality is manifested and expressed in thoughts, fantasies, desires, beliefs, attitudes, values, actions, behavior, gender roles and relationships. Although sexuality may include all of these aspects, not all of them are felt and manifested at the same time. Sexuality is influenced by many factors: biological, psychological, social, political, ethical, historical and others.
Erotic are called representations, fantasies and experiences of a person associated with such interpersonal interaction, during which sexual desire is satisfied. As a rule, the subject of erotic interest is a representative of the opposite sex (heteroeroticism), but it can also be a person of the same sex (homoeroticism). Autoeroticism is also possible, in which only one’s body, one’s sexual manifestations and experiences are of erotic interest.
* who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/gender_rights/defining_sexual_health.pdf
It is useful for adults to understand what happens to a child at different stages of psychosexual development, what problems he has, how to respond to physiological changes, to manifestations of sexuality and eroticism. By imagining this picture, we can build relationships with children taking into account their gender, individual characteristics, create favorable conditions for their psychosexual development and avoid situations that cause tension and anxiety in children. It will be easier and calmer for parents if they know what exactly to pay attention to at each stage, what requires their special support at the moment, what requirements for the child will be overestimated, what changes should be expected in the near future. The competence of parents in these matters is the best prevention of any failures in the sexual development of children.
Igor Dobryakov – Candidate of Medical Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Child Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Medical Psychology, North-Western State Medical University. I. I. Mechnikov. Member of the editorial boards of the journals “Perinatal Psychology”, “Issues of Mental Health of Children and Adolescents”, “Children’s Medicine of the North-West”. Author of dozens of scientific papers, as well as co-author of the books “Development of a Child’s Personality from Birth to a Year” (Rama Publishing, 2010), “Child Psychiatry” (Peter, 2005), “Psychology of Health”.
Freud’s stages
Sigmund Freud at the end of the XNUMXth and beginning of the XNUMXth century developed a theory based on the assumption that much in the formation of a person’s personality and behavior is associated with sexual experiences repressed into the subconscious, including childhood ones. Psychosexual development, according to Freud, consists in the transition from one stage to another. This is accompanied by the emergence of new forms of satisfaction of needs and the refusal (albeit incomplete) of the predominant use of forms characteristic of the previous stage. If, due to external reasons, some forms of satisfaction are encouraged or, on the contrary, suppressed, such forms can become fixed, that is, become habitual, so that the child will return to them all the time.
The names of the stages of psychosexual development according to Freud are associated with the zones of the body that are responsible at certain stages of the development of the child for the satisfaction of sexual desire and for the pleasure received from the functioning of their body:
- oral (lat. oris – mouth) stage – the first year;
- anal (lat. anus – anus) stage – 1-3 years;
- phallic (Greek phallos – penis) stage -3-6 years;
- latent (lat. latentis – hidden) – 6 (7) – 11 (12) years;
- genital (lat. genitalia – genitals) – 12-18 years.
Oral stage: the mother-child system
At the oral stage, the existence of a child is simply impossible without a mother. Together they represent a complex and well-coordinated mother-child system. In this case, the child is forced to be passive. He has not yet separated himself from the surrounding world, has not built his own boundaries. He does not separate his body from his mother’s body. The territory, the study of which is available to him, is extremely limited. The most accessible is your own body. In the process of his research, the baby accidentally discovers the specificity of the tactile sensitivity of the genital organs, gets the experience of pleasure from playing with his own genitals. A moderate amount of such autoerotic stimulation is necessary for the normal development of the child.
However, the infant receives the strongest, vital experiences when exploring another object available to him – the mother. Clinging to her, feeling her, he gets a lot of sensations, accompanied by positive emotions. But he manages to get the brightest, most diverse sensations with the help of his mouth. Sucking, biting, chewing the breast, swallowing the milk coming from it allow for a short time to merge with the mother as much as possible, to some extent preserve the unity of the mother-child dyad. Thus, sexual sensations, the essence of which is merging with a loved object, interpenetration in order to maximally erase boundaries and thereby reduce anxiety, at this stage of the phase are focused on the mouth area, especially when breastfeeding. In this case, the child receives a very important experience of interaction.
Anal stage: possession of the body
In an effort to learn about the world around him, to make it more predictable and thereby reduce anxiety, the child improves his movements, masters new spaces. At the same time, he experiences positive emotions, including pride in the ability to control his body. A special role in this is played by the development of neatness skills. The ability to hold and expel waste products is accompanied by sensual pleasure, reinforced by the praise of parents. The voluntary excretion of excrement means for the child both confirmation of the perfection of control of his body, and the development of the external environment in which he leaves his traces, just as some animals (for example, wolves) mark their territory. Therefore, the great interest of children in their secretions is understandable. It happens that, having pooped, the baby examines with surprise, pride and delight his work lying in the pot, takes it in his hands and holds it out to his mother to share his feelings with her. She, unfortunately, does not share them, which causes a whole range of emotions in the child: disappointment, anxiety, aggression …
When potty training a child, parents for the first time begin to demand that they conform to a certain social norm. Mother’s chagrin, censure, punishment for wet or soiled pants, that is, punishment for something that was not previously paid attention, causes bewilderment, sometimes ambivalent emotions towards the mother, protest reactions. If relations in the family are harmonious, if the child is desired, then he is treated with respect and the development of neatness skills goes unnoticed. Everything turns out somehow by itself. At the same time, mothers subsequently hardly remember how they taught the child to use the potty. The more anxious parents are, the more they are concerned about early potty training, the more problems arise. The child often becomes stubborn, sometimes aggressive, his mood is unstable. Life forces him to learn to deal with his emotions. This makes the little person more independent, he becomes more independent.
The choice of the predominant stimulus for mastering new skills (fear of punishment, fear of upsetting the mother, the desire to obtain sensual sensations, positive emotions) can leave an imprint on the further development of the child. Achieving a certain degree of independence by the age of three leads to the fact that he is already beginning to realize his boundaries, distinguishes himself from the world around him, which marks the transition of the child to the next stage of development.
The phallic stage: self-awareness
The phallic stage is characterized by the formation of a new mental function in the child – self-awareness. It is manifested by the ability to distinguish oneself from the surrounding world, to distinguish between oneself and others. At the same time, the child begins to call himself not in the third, as before, but in the first person (“I!”). The mother-child system, based on the impossibility of existing without each other, is collapsing. Mother and child are only now two separate people, although the mother still remains the most significant person for the child.
Separated from his mother, he discovers that all people are divided into two parts: men and women. Others classify the child as one of the groups, but in order to understand the essence of their gender, to actively assimilate their gender role, they need to figure out what the differences between men and women are. Interest in the arrangement of one’s own and someone else’s body, in the secret of birth is manifested in relevant questions, peeping, in organizing joint games for boys and girls, accompanied by exposure and demonstration of the genitals. Attitude towards both parents often acquires an ambivalent character. The parent of the same sex is perceived as a competitor, to which the child is jealous of the parent of the opposite sex. Moreover, the latter begins to arouse more interest in him than before, as the closest and most familiar representative of the opposite sex. At the final stage of this stage, the child creates a certain infantile concept about the differences and relationships of the sexes. Some variants of such concepts are unfavorable and frighten children. Other concepts are positively perceived, contribute to the child’s acceptance of his sexual role and readiness to improve it.
The study of the formation of human sexuality, undertaken by Freud, his students and followers, convincingly showed that sexuality is already present in infants, develops and has its own characteristics in different age periods. But erotica arises only when self-consciousness appears, that is, when a person distinguishes himself from the surrounding world, begins to call himself in the first person, builds and realizes his physical and mental boundaries, feels a sense of shame of nakedness.
Separation from the mother at this stage occurred, but the distance from her continues, the need for independence grows. If a mother is unhappy in marriage, she unconsciously often tries to compensate for the lack of warmth, communication, positive emotions at the expense of the child. At the same time, his desire for independence, distance frightens her. She will strive to maintain intimacy, to remain necessary for the child in everything. Such a mother will suppress any manifestations of independence, thereby provoking negativism and disobedience, reflecting the baby’s struggle for its independence, its development.
The main result of the successful passage of this stage is the discovery by the child of the possibility of obtaining vivid positive emotions from bodily and emotional contact with another person. At the same time, a sense of basic trust in another is laid, which largely determines his relationship with others in the future.
Latent stage: family and school
The interests of the child at this stage increasingly go beyond the circle of the family. Having started studying at school, the child changes his social status – he becomes a schoolboy. He has new responsibilities, worries, others begin to treat him differently. This leads to further estrangement from the parents, their authority somewhat fades, as it cannot compete with the authority of a new person in the life of a child – a teacher (usually a teacher). The teacher, from the point of view of most elementary school students, knows much more than mom or dad. Many parents are often faced with the fact that the children, as the last and most important argument in some dispute, declare: “Anna Kirillovna (Maria Petrovna or others) didn’t tell us so!”
Children of school age communicate with each other much more and in a qualitatively different way, since at this age they finally realize the irreversibility of their gender. Boys and girls show different interests corresponding to their gender, choose different games and partners in them, but at the same time, children are embarrassed to show interest in issues of sexual life. That is why the stage of psychosexual development of children aged 7–11 years is called “latent”, that is, “hidden”. Children, being at this stage of development, are much less likely than before to ask adults “uncomfortable” questions on sexual topics, less often play games related to exposure. At the same time, there is no decrease in interest in sexual issues among children.
Therefore, at this stage, there is a division (segregation) of the class according to gender: boys play only with boys, and girls with girls. Gradually, starting at about 8 years of age, segregation reaches a maximum in ten-year-olds. Thus, in the latent phase, there is a further active acceptance and formation of the sex role, the assimilation of its characteristic features of behavior. This is manifested in the form of a deliberate underlining, respectively, of masculine (peculiar to men) or feminine (feminine) features. Fear leads to concealment of interest in the opposite sex: “if you hang out with girls, then you yourself are a girl!” Children at this age have various sexual manifestations, including sexual games, but they become less pronounced than in the previous stage.
Hidden sympathy
In one of the schools in St. Petersburg, an experiment was conducted to reveal the hidden interest of children aged 10–11 in peers of the opposite sex. A total of 167 children took part in the experiment. The number of boys and girls was approximately the same (80 and 87 respectively). The guys of one class were invited in turn to the office, where envelopes with their names were laid out on the table. The subject was given 3 beautiful postcards and offered to give them to three classmates, putting them in envelopes with the names of the chosen ones. In two classes we observed children. In this variant, in the vast majority of cases, boys put postcards to boys, and girls to girls. Only two boys and one girl dared to put postcards in the envelopes of children of the opposite sex.
Children of the other two classes were assured that no one (including the experimenter) would know who their choice fell on, during which the subject was left alone. The subject did not meet with those who were yet to participate in the experiment. Thus, the second version of the experiment allowed the participants to create the illusion of anonymity of choice, to show an emotional, rather than a utilitarian-business attitude towards the chosen one. As a result, 36,3% of boys and 48,1% of girls put postcards to classmates of the opposite sex. At the same time, 30,6% of boys expected to receive a postcard from girls, and 54,1% of girls – from boys.
Thus, it seems obvious that many children have a certain interest and liking for classmates of the opposite sex, but they try to keep it a secret. This is due to the high value that the sexual role acquires by this age, the fear that, closely communicating with peers of the opposite sex, one can be considered inadequate to one’s own. This is confirmed by simple observations of the games of children of this age. If a boy and a girl begin to spend time together, they are invariably ridiculed by their peers, who, as a rule, seek to end their relationship or continue it in deep secrecy.
The Genital Stage: The New Shyness
With the onset of puberty, both boys and girls have an increased interest in sexual life, the so-called physiological (natural, normal) adolescent hypersexuality arises. At this stage, the struggle for its borders reaches its climax. The change in appearance associated with the appearance of secondary sexual characteristics changes the attitude of others towards adolescents. In this period, separation from parents is final, the boundaries of both body and soul are built rigidly. A young man has his secrets from his parents, his body is the body of an adult boy (or girl), with the normal development of family relations, he will never again be naked in front of them. Individualization of the body leads to new cultural taboos, new individual modesty. Shame guards the “inner sacred space”, is the main motive that encourages people to seek solitude for sex. Not all parents are comfortable with this. This may reflect their difficulties, including sexual ones.
Experiencing this stage, the adolescent makes a choice between maintaining the relationship of child-parent dependence and acquiring new partner sexual-erotic relationships. His future life largely depends on this choice. If at this age relationships with parents or friends of the same sex are more valuable to a teenager than first love, then this may indicate that he is still a child. The friendship of a young man with a girl not only does not call into question their adequacy of their sexual role, but, on the contrary, confirms it, helps to solve the problem of emotional separation from their parents.
Last frontier
However, if a teenager manages to win the battle for his autonomy, for the maximum possible closeness of his bodily and spiritual boundaries, he begins to experience a nagging feeling of loneliness, basal anxiety, existential longing again takes possession of him. A changed, matured body, an interest in the opposite sex, sensual desires, the upcoming need to choose a vocation, uncertainty about one’s masculine (or feminine) qualities, capabilities are disturbing … The desire for a sexual debut and the fear of being insolvent in this situation lead to an outwardly cynical attitude towards sexual issues relations, demonstrating their competence in this area, which, in particular, is expressed in the use of obscene language.
At first vague, but then more and more definite dreams appear, a desire to find a person who can be trusted with both your innermost thoughts, doubts, and your body, a person who will also trust you. I want to, but it’s very scary to be deceived, because there are no guarantees in love, love is always an unknown and a test.
Sexual intercourse is the most complete removal of bodily boundaries. Going to remove bodily boundaries is much easier than opening spiritual ones. The American sociologist David Riesman observed that sex is a kind of “last frontier” on which a person hopes to assert his individuality*. Thus, unlike animals, in which sexual intercourse is mainly aimed at reproduction, in humans, libido has another vital function associated with gaining self-awareness, with the understanding that his life is finite, since human sexual relations allow him not to feel being alone in this world, being unique to your partner, finding immortality in a child from a loved one. When all the taboos and taboos that restrict the availability of sex disappear, in itself it turns out to be an empty and insignificant act. In adolescence, manipulative sex without erotica, that is, without trusting spiritual relationships, only leads to the removal of physiological stress. At the same time, anxiety not only does not decrease, but, as a rule, grows. The other side of anxiety is aggression. Therefore, adolescents may not have enough information about the “technical” side of sexual life and about contraceptives. It is important for them to understand that the main thing in a relationship is erotica, trust, psychological intimacy.
* «Culture and social character. The work of D. Riesman reviewed» (Glencoe, 1961).
“Let her not think that you are in love with her”
The first story. An attempt to hide his sympathy for a particular girl often manifests itself in the form of aggressive actions aimed specifically at her. One of these fighters was once brought to my reception.
“And I know why you pester her,” I said, when, after listening to the complaints of my parents, we were left alone with him, “you just fell in love.
What happened to him! He blushed and began to yell:
– You yourself fell in love!
I said that I must have made a mistake and asked for forgiveness. He gradually calmed down, and we began to talk on various interesting topics. Realizing that a confidential contact had been established, I again spoke about the girl whom he offended, asked to tell about her, assuring me that I knew how to keep secrets, that no one would know about our conversation. At first he answered leading questions, and then I listened to a real poem in prose about a wonderful girl, better than whom there is in the world. At the end of the conversation, seeing me as a serious and attentive listener, he became completely frank and took out of his pocket a pencil wrapped in a handkerchief. It was her gift. One day in class, he discovered that he had forgotten his pencil case at home, and she helped him out. We parted amicably. At the end of the conversation, the patient agreed that the emphasized negative attitude towards this girl, on the one hand, upsets her and does not arouse her sympathy for the offender, and on the other hand, can lead to someone guessing about his true feelings, like me. .
The second story. Once at school I saw such a scene. The girl asked the boy to give her a book. It was noticeable that the request pleased him and embarrassed him. He blushed, and then hit her on the head with a book:
– Here’s a book for you!
The girl’s reaction was unexpected. Smiling, she loudly and proudly announced to the teacher and to everyone present:
– Olga Vitalievna, Petrov hit me!
The hidden meaning of her words was clear: “Look at everything, he singles me out, he likes me!” It is very insulting for girls who are not touched by anyone, who do not pull their pigtails.
Third story. Recently, more and more often we have to deal with the fact that girls are aggressive no less than boys, they always hurt and provoke them. Often, the confrontation between groups of boys and girls manifests itself in emotionally charged exciting games. One student told me about how wonderful he is with his classmates during the breaks:
– Immediately after the call, we run into the corridor and start chasing the girls. If we catch one, we hold it, and the other girls attack and beat it off, and then we chase after them!
Actually, such behavior is brilliantly described by Grigory Oster:
“Girls should never be seen anywhere. And do not give passage to them Nowhere and never. They need to substitute legs, To scare from around the corner, So that they immediately understand: You don’t care about them. I met a girl – quickly show her your tongue. Let her not think that you are in love with her.