individuals who self-identify as sex addicts, unique health and social consequences are not well understood because of factors, such as stigma. It is important that the nursing community understand this phenomenon to address, understand, and provide sensitive and meaningful care. However, there is limited research on this topic. The purpose of this study was to explore the lived experience of individuals who self-identify as sex addicts. Through snowball sampling, five men and five women between 27 to 45 years old, and older. participated in the phenomenological study. Meaning units and themes were revealed through the participants' experiences as follows: A Connecting with Others: 1. Reaching Out 2. Seeking Shared Understanding 3. Connecting with Your Higher Power B Managing Stigma: 1. Revealing Concealing C Integrating the Past for Recovery: 1. Reflecting Triggers 2. Overcoming Powerlessness. D Being Vigilant: 1. Intentional Refocusing 2. Living an Honest Life E Giving of Oneself: 1. Informing Others 2. Doing Service. The overall structure synthesized from the meaning units and themes was: "The lived experience of seeking health in recovery from sex addiction is dancing on the outer circle, connected to a community that understands fear, shame and the struggle to remain vigilant for pitfalls while intentionally refocusing on living an honest life of giving and receiving." Seeking health incorporates a holistic, community involved, multifaceted approach to recovery. Understanding how individuals seek health in recovery provides a framework to impart meaningful, sensitive nursing care. / by Lawren Mundy. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2013. / Includes bibliography. / Mode of access: World Wide Web. / System requirements: Adobe Reader.

Sexual excess is one of an increasing list of ‘excessive’ behaviours which have in recent times been pathologised by the psycho-medical establishment, increasing regulation and control of spheres previously accepted as ‘normal.’ This study analyses the genealogy of the events, institutions, organisations and individuals in post-World War II United States of America to the present which made it possible to think scientifically and nosologically about ‘excessive’ male sexual behaviour as ‘sexual addiction.’ / The grass-roots twelve-step ideologies of Alcoholics Anonymous in the mid-1970s gave birth to twelve-step programs for ‘sex addicts’ predicated on admitting powerlessness over sex and lust rather than over alcohol as the key to recovery as the first step. The publication of Patrick Carnes’ Out of the Shadows: Understanding and Treating Sexual Addiction in 1983 created the academic concept and discourse of sex addiction, which in turn paved the way for widespread scientific debate and investigation of the concept. The AIDS phenomenon offered a platform for many groups to highlight their own causes amid the chaos of illness and death. The sex addiction movement was one such group which made use of the hysteria by pathologising homosexuality and the gay lifestyle as symptomatic of ‘sexual addiction.’ This forged an inexorable conceptual nexus between sexual addiction and AIDS and death motifs, thereby legitimising the concept of sexual addiction as a harmful and often fatal disorder. / Analysis of psycho-medical and public discourse on the sex lives of two American presidents, John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton, in two different eras revealed changing understandings of male sexual excess. Journalistic mores, socio-cultural values and psycho-medical ideologies (or the lack thereof) played a great role in pathologising Clinton’s behaviour while leaving Kennedy’s, at the time of his presidency but not so in the decades following it, unscathed. / This study has far-reaching implications because sex is an issue affecting and involving people from all walks of life, irrespective of gender, race, colour, creed or religion. Analyses demonstrated how the sexual addiction movement’s assault on traditional conceptions of masculinity predicated on promiscuity as a rite of passage or envied and admired behaviour has precipitated a convergence of the genders in respect of prescriptive sexual behaviour. The pendulum of power is subtly shifting from males embracing notions of sexual liberation and sexual self-determination to mental health professionals whose new diagnostic labels pathologise and stigmatise.

Sexmissbrukets underliggande orsaker skiljer sig åt och detta beror på flera faktorer som exempelvis internet, alkohol och droger. Denna studie behandlar sexmissbrukets utveckling under åren 1990 till 2000. Studiens syfte är att visa på den samexistens som begreppet anses ha med andra missbruk som visas genom de faktorer som kommer att nämnas i studien. Studien som är en litteraturbaserad översikt bygger på sex artiklar och en rapport som analyserats utifrån systemteorin. Studien visar att sexmissbruk kan tolkas på olika sätt beroende på den målgrupp som kommer i kontakt med begreppet. Det centrala är att sexmissbruk ses som ett dolt problem och utvecklas genom samexistensen med alkohol och droger. Denna samexistens initieras under slutet av 1990-talet och det sker en drastisk ökning under 2000-talet. Det vi kan konstatera i studien är att resultatet av ökningen har ett direkt samband med utvecklingen och användningen av internet i kombination med alkohol och droger. Min slutsats är därmed att internet och cybersex i kombination med nämnda droger leder till den samexistens som studien visar på. Studien visar alltså på att faktorerna har ett samband med varandra och att sexmissbruk inte bara är ett missbruk, utan även multipla missbruk, ett blandmissbruk.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Denver Theological Seminary, 2006. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 507-522).

Sexual excess is one of an increasing list of ‘excessive’ behaviours which have in recent times been pathologised by the psycho-medical establishment, increasing regulation and control of spheres previously accepted as ‘normal.’ This study analyses the genealogy of the events, institutions, organisations and individuals in post-World War II United States of America to the present which made it possible to think scientifically and nosologically about ‘excessive’ male sexual behaviour as ‘sexual addiction.’ / The grass-roots twelve-step ideologies of Alcoholics Anonymous in the mid-1970s gave birth to twelve-step programs for ‘sex addicts’ predicated on admitting powerlessness over sex and lust rather than over alcohol as the key to recovery as the first step. The publication of Patrick Carnes’ Out of the Shadows: Understanding and Treating Sexual Addiction in 1983 created the academic concept and discourse of sex addiction, which in turn paved the way for widespread scientific debate and investigation of the concept. The AIDS phenomenon offered a platform for many groups to highlight their own causes amid the chaos of illness and death. The sex addiction movement was one such group which made use of the hysteria by pathologising homosexuality and the gay lifestyle as symptomatic of ‘sexual addiction.’ This forged an inexorable conceptual nexus between sexual addiction and AIDS and death motifs, thereby legitimising the concept of sexual addiction as a harmful and often fatal disorder. / Analysis of psycho-medical and public discourse on the sex lives of two American presidents, John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton, in two different eras revealed changing understandings of male sexual excess. Journalistic mores, socio-cultural values and psycho-medical ideologies (or the lack thereof) played a great role in pathologising Clinton’s behaviour while leaving Kennedy’s, at the time of his presidency but not so in the decades following it, unscathed. / This study has far-reaching implications because sex is an issue affecting and involving people from all walks of life, irrespective of gender, race, colour, creed or religion. Analyses demonstrated how the sexual addiction movement’s assault on traditional conceptions of masculinity predicated on promiscuity as a rite of passage or envied and admired behaviour has precipitated a convergence of the genders in respect of prescriptive sexual behaviour. The pendulum of power is subtly shifting from males embracing notions of sexual liberation and sexual self-determination to mental health professionals whose new diagnostic labels pathologise and stigmatise.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Denver Theological Seminary, 2006. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 507-522).

Thesis project (D. Min.)--Denver Seminary, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 257-263).

Patients seeking help for hypersexual behavior often exhibit features of impulsivity, cognitive rigidity, poor judgment, deficits in emotion regulation, and excessive preoccupation with sex. Some of these characteristics are also common among patients presenting with neurological pathology associated with executive dysfunction. These observations led to the current investigation in which differences across scores on objective neuropsychological tests of executive functioning were explored in a group of hypersexual male patients (n = 30) compared with a non-hypersexual community sample (n = 30) of men. Using multivariate statistics, differences between the groups were examined yielding significant differences on measures of hypersexuality. However, the groups failed to exhibit significant differences across neuropsychological tests of executive functioning. These results contradict a previous finding of executive deficits among hypersexual men measured by self-report. These findings are discussed as they pertain to conceptualizations of hypersexual populations and possible implications for future research.

This study examined the psychometric properties of the Trauma Inventory for Partners of Sex Addicts (TIPSA). Using the Nominal Response Model (NRM), I examined several aspects of item and option functioning including discrimination, empirical category ordering, and information. Category Boundary Discrimination (CBD) parameters were calculated to determine the extent to which respondents distinguished between adjacent categories. Indistinguishable categories were collapsed through recoding. Empirically disordered response categories were also collapsed through recoding. Findings revealed that recoding solved some technical functioning issues in some items, and also revealed items (and perhaps option anchors) that were probably poorly conceived initially. In addition, nuisance or error variance was reduced only marginally by recoding, and the relative standing of respondents on the trait continuum remained largely unchanged. Items in need of modification or removal were identified, and issues of content validity were discussed.

Inledning: Överdrivna sexuella handlingar och de risker de kan medföra har beskrivits sedan antiken. Hur man sett på problemen har varierat beroende på vilket religiöst eller politiskt perspektiv man utgått ifrån. Man har ännu inte kunnat enas om vilken term som bäst beskriver problemen, vilket försvårar forskningen och skapar osäkerhet om hur problemen ska behandlas. Den term som allt oftare används bland allmänheten och i media är sexmissbruk. Allt fler söker hjälp för problem som de själva kallar sexmissbruk. De flesta som söker hjälp är män. Syfte och frågeställningar: Denna studie syftar till att öka kunskapen om hur hjälpsökande män ser på och förstår sitt sexmissbruk med följande frågeställningar: Hur beskriver männen sitt sexmissbruk? Hur upplever de sexmissbruket? Hur förklarar männen sitt sexmissbruk? Metod: En kvalitativ metod med fenomenologisk och deskriptiv ansats har använts. Fem vuxna män, som själva uppgett att de har ett sexmissbruk, har intervjuats. Männen går i psykodynamisk psykoterapi på en mottagning där man kan söka hjälp för sexuella problem. De transkriberade intervjuerna har analyserats med hjälp av kvalitativ innehållsanalys. Resultat: Studiens resultat presenteras under fyra kategorier och ett flertal underkategorier. De fyra kategorierna omfattar männens faktiska beskrivning av sexmissbruket, olika typer av insikt i problemen, sexmissbrukets konsekvenser – individuella och sociala, samt männens egna förklaringar till sitt sexmissbruk. Ett övergripande tema, som löper som en röd tråd genom samtliga kategorier, tolkas som att leva med skam. Diskussion: Männens beskrivning av sitt sexmissbruk stämmer väl överens med hur man tidigare definierat problemen. Missbruket omfattar olika handlingar och har konsekvenser för männen själva, deras nära relationer och sociala liv. Studien visar att män med sexmissbruk för en kamp med sin skam. De har olika grader av skam och olika försvar mot skam. Skammen beskrivs som en form av "motor" i missbruksprocessen, vilket överensstämmer med tidigare forskningsresultat. Männen uppger att förklaringar till problem med sexmissbruk finns i deras uppväxtförhållanden och tidigare erfarenheter. De uttrycker behov av hjälp för att kunna ta sig ur missbruket. För att kunna hjälpa män med sexmissbruk behöver man som psykoterapeut ha mod att möta skammen, både den hjälpsökandes och den egna.