Kinsey scale
Encyclopedia
Kinsey Reports
The Kinsey Reports are two books on human sexual behavior, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female , by Dr. Alfred Kinsey, Wardell Pomeroy and others and published by Saunders...
, an additional grade, listed as "X", was used for asexuality
Asexuality
Asexuality , in its broadest sense, is the lack of sexual attraction and, in some cases, the lack of interest in sex. Sometimes, it is considered a lack of a sexual orientation...
. It was first published in Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (1948) by Alfred Kinsey
Alfred Kinsey
Alfred Charles Kinsey was an American biologist and professor of entomology and zoology, who in 1947 founded the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University, now known as the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction, as well as producing the Kinsey Reports and the Kinsey...
, Wardell Pomeroy
Wardell Pomeroy
Wardell Baxter Pomeroy was an American sexologist and co-author with Alfred C. Kinsey. He was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan. He graduated from Indiana University and earned a Ph.D. in psychology in 1954 from Columbia University...
and others, and was also prominent in the complementary work Sexual Behavior in the Human Female (1953). Numbers 1 to 5 indicate bisexuality.
Overview
Introducing the scale, Kinsey wrote:Today, many sexologists
Sexology
Sexology is the scientific study of human sexuality, including human sexual interests, behavior, and function. The term does not generally refer to the non-scientific study of sex, such as political analysis or social criticism....
see the Kinsey scale as relevant to sexual orientation but not comprehensive enough to cover all sexual identity issues. They suggest that sexual identity
Sexual identity
Sexual identity is a term that, like sex, has two distinctively different meanings. One describes an identity roughly based on sexual orientation, the other an identity based on sexual characteristics, which is not socially based but based on biology, a concept related to, but different from,...
involves at least three different spectra
Spectrum
A spectrum is a condition that is not limited to a specific set of values but can vary infinitely within a continuum. The word saw its first scientific use within the field of optics to describe the rainbow of colors in visible light when separated using a prism; it has since been applied by...
, sexual orientation
Sexual orientation
Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...
being only one of them (two others being biological sex and gender identity
Gender identity
A gender identity is the way in which an individual self-identifies with a gender category, for example, as being either a man or a woman, or in some cases being neither, which can be distinct from biological sex. Basic gender identity is usually formed by age three and is extremely difficult to...
).
There have been similar studies where the scale is from 0 to 10. In such studies, the person would be asked a question such as "If 0 is completely gay and 10 is completely straight, what is your orientation number?".
Table of the scale
The scale is as follows:| Rating | Description |
|---|---|
| 0 | Exclusively heterosexual |
| 1 | Predominantly heterosexual, only incidentally homosexual |
| 2 | Predominantly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual |
| 3 | Bisexual |
| 4 | Predominantly homosexual, but more than incidentally heterosexual |
| 5 | Predominantly homosexual, only incidentally heterosexual |
| 6 | Exclusively homosexual |
| * | Asexuality Asexuality Asexuality , in its broadest sense, is the lack of sexual attraction and, in some cases, the lack of interest in sex. Sometimes, it is considered a lack of a sexual orientation... and Pansexuality Pansexuality Pansexuality refers to the potential for sexual attractions, sexual desire, romantic love, or emotional attraction, towards people of all gender identities and biological sexes... (are not part of Kinsey scale) |
Kinsey reports
- Men: 11.6% of white males aged 20–35 were given a rating of 3 for this period of their lives. The study also reported that 10% of American males surveyed were "more or less exclusively homosexual for at least three years between the ages of 16 and 55" (in the 5 to 6 range).
- Women: 7% of single females aged 20–35 and 4% of previously married females aged 20–35 were given a rating of 3 for this period of their lives. 2 to 6% of females, aged 20–35, were given a rating of 5 and 1 to 3% of unmarried females aged 20–35 were rated as 6.
Alternate measures of sexual orientation
The Kinsey Scale does not address all possible sexual expressions. Others have stepped forward to define it further.Michael Storms in 1980 proposed a two dimensional chart with an X and Y axis. This scale took into account the case of asexuality
Asexuality
Asexuality , in its broadest sense, is the lack of sexual attraction and, in some cases, the lack of interest in sex. Sometimes, it is considered a lack of a sexual orientation...
and the simultaneous expression of hetero-eroticism and homo-eroticism.
Fritz Klein, in his Klein Sexual Orientation Grid
Klein Sexual Orientation Grid
The Klein Sexual Orientation Grid developed by Dr. Fritz Klein attempts to further measure sexual orientation by expanding upon the earlier Kinsey scale which categorizes sexual history from 0 to 6...
included factors such as how orientation can change throughout a person's lifetime, as well as emotional and social orientation.
Kinsey, Storm, and Klein are only 3 of more than 200 scales to measure and describe sexual orientation. For example there are scales that rate homosexual behaviors from 1 to 14, and measures for gender, masculinity, femininity, transsexualism and attitudes towards contraceptives.
See also
- Bisexual erasureBisexual erasureBisexual erasure is the tendency to ignore, remove, falsify, or reexplain evidence of bisexuality in history, academia, the news media, and other primary sources...
- Gender binaryGender binaryThe gender binary is the classification of sex and gender into two distinct and disconnected forms of masculine and feminine. It is one general type of a gender system. It can describe a social boundary that discourages people from crossing or mixing gender roles, or from creating other third ...
- Klein Sexual Orientation GridKlein Sexual Orientation GridThe Klein Sexual Orientation Grid developed by Dr. Fritz Klein attempts to further measure sexual orientation by expanding upon the earlier Kinsey scale which categorizes sexual history from 0 to 6...
- Hybrid Sexuality ScaleHybrid Sexuality ScaleHybrid scale of sexuality is a table used at first to spell out the terms of Alfred Kinsey. But later, due to editorial conflicts, Kinsey happened to be just one of the inspirational sources of this new scale. This new scale is not intended to refute the theories of Kinsey...
- Taxonomy of Uranismus