Paraphilia

Paraphilias are emotional disorders defined as sexually arousing fantasies, urges, or behaviors that are recurrent, intense, or occur.

Paraphilia refers to a condition of having abnormal sexual desires. It involves recurring, intense sexually arousing mental imagery or behavior that centers around socially unacceptable practices.

The term "paraphilia" derives from the Greek words "para" (which means outside of) and "philia" (which means loving). Paraphilia is classified as a disorder when it causes significant distress or poses a threat to others. It often involves a fixation on particular objects or behaviors that become essential for sexual gratification.

According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5), to be diagnosed with paraphilia, there must be recurrent, intense paraphilic fantasies, urges, or behaviors that persist for at least six months. Additionally, these behaviors must cause significant distress or interfere with work, social, or other important areas of functioning. Diagnosis also requires that the behavior involves harm or risk to others or causes impairment in various life areas.

The prevalence of paraphilic disorders is challenging to determine due to secrecy and underreporting, especially among women. Men predominantly exhibit these disorders, with masochism being a notable exception, more common in women. Many individuals with paraphilia exhibit multiple such behaviors, often beginning these fantasies before the age of 13.

Paraphilia and paraphilic disorders are related concepts but differ significantly in terms of their impact on individuals and others.

Paraphilias refer to atypical sexual interests, while paraphilic disorders specifically involve paraphilias that cause distress, impairment, or harm. The DSM-5 introduced this distinction to avoid automatically labeling all non-normative sexual behaviors as psychopathological.

According to the most current standard reference for mental disorders, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5), preceded by the DSM-IV and DSM-IV-TR, there are several different types of paraphilias, each of which has a different focus of the sufferer's sexual arousal. Here is a list of paraphilias:

• Voyeurism: watching an unsuspecting/non-consenting individual who is either nude, disrobing, or engaging in sexual activity
• Exhibitionism: exposing one’s genitals to an unsuspecting person
• Frotteurism: touching or rubbing against a non-consenting person
• Sexual masochism: being humiliated, beaten, bound, or otherwise suffering
• Sexual sadism: the physical or emotional suffering of another person
• Pedophilia: sexual activity with a prepubescent child (usually 13 years old or younger)
• Fetishism: a sexual fascination with nonliving objects or highly specific body parts (partialism). Examples of specific fetishisms include somnophilia (sexual arousal by an unconscious person) and urophilia (deriving sexual pleasure from seeing or thinking about urine or urinating)
• Transvestism: cross-dressing that is sexually arousing and interferes with functioning
• Autogynephilia: is a subtype of transvestism that refers specifically to men who become aroused by thinking or visualizing themselves as a woman.
• Another specified paraphilia: some paraphilias do not meet full diagnostic criteria for a paraphilic disorder but may have uncontrolled sexual impulses that cause enough distress for the sufferer that they are recognized. Examples of such specific paraphilias include necrophilia (corpses), scatology (obscene phone calls), coprophilia (feces and defecation), and zoophilia (animals).

Urges to engage in coercive or otherwise aggressive sex like rape are not symptoms of a mental illness. Such sexual offending is therefore not considered paraphilia.

Biological issues thought to be risk factors for paraphilias include some differences in brain activity during sexual arousal, as well as general brain structure. Mental health professionals have found that male pedophiles have lower IQ scores on psychological testing compared to men who are not pedophiles. Research has also determined that they tend to have a history of earning lower grades in school than their non-pedophilic counterparts, regardless of intellectual abilities and learning styles.

There are several psychological theories about how paraphilias develop. Some view these disorders as a manifestation of arrested psychosexual development, with the paraphilic behaviors defending the person's psyche against anxiety (defense mechanisms). Others believe paraphilias are the result of the sufferer associating something with sexual arousal and interests, or by having unusual early life sexual experiences reinforced by having an orgasm. Some view these paraphilia disorders as another form of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Psychologically, pedophiles who act on their urges by sexually offending tend to engage in grossly distorted thinking, in that they use their position of power and view offending as an appropriate way to meet their needs, think about children as equal sexual beings to adults, and consider their sexual needs as uncontrollable.

Another theory about paraphilia risk factors is that they are linked to stages of childhood psychological development like temperament, early relationship formation, trauma repetition, and disrupted development of sexuality, as follows:

• Temperament: a tendency to be overly inhibited or uncontrolled with emotions and behaviors
• Early relationship formation: a lack of stable self-awareness, trouble managing emotions, and seeking help and comfort from others
• Trauma repetition: People who are the victim of sexual or other forms of abuse, especially if it occurs during childhood, may identify with the abuser such that they act out what was inflicted on them by victimizing others in some way. They may also act out the trauma by somehow harming themselves.
• Disrupted development of sexuality: The patterns of what brings one sexual pleasure tend to form by adolescence. People raised in a household that is either excessively sexually permissive or inhibited are at higher risk for developing paraphilia.

Family risk factors for paraphilia development include high conflict between parents or low supervision by parents, a lack of affection from the mother, and generally not feeling treated well by their parents. People with paraphilia tend to have trouble making and keeping friends and other relationships.

While the desired sexual stimulant for the paraphilia sufferer depends on the specific paraphilia, the characteristics of the illness are often very similar. Specifically, people with paraphilia tend to experience arousal by the stimulant to the exclusion or near exclusion of more common sources of sexual interest, like an attractive person of similar age. The intensity of the sexual attraction can be overwhelming enough to cause distress. The unusual or forbidden nature of paraphilia often causes symptoms of guilt and fear of punishment.

Symptoms of paraphilia can include preoccupation to the point of obsessiveness that may intrude on the person's attempts to think about other things or engage in more conventional sexual activity with an age-appropriate partner. Paraphilia sufferers may experience depression or anxiety that is temporarily relieved by engaging in paraphilic behavior, thus leading to an addictive cycle.

Usually, providers of mental health care help make the diagnosis of paraphilias, including licensed mental health therapists, psychiatrists, psychologists, psychiatric nurses, physician assistants, and social workers. One of these professionals will likely conduct or refer the person with paraphilia for an extensive medical interview and physical examination as part of establishing the diagnosis. To ensure that the paraphilic individual does not suffer from a medical condition that could complicate the assessment or treatment of their mental health condition, medical professionals often perform routine laboratory tests during the initial evaluation.

As part of this examination, the sufferer may be asked a series of questions from a standardized questionnaire or self-test to help assess the presence of paraphilic symptoms. A mental health professional will conduct a thorough exploration of any history or presence of all mental health symptoms such that paraphilia can be distinguished from other types of mental disorders. People with pedophilia may also suffer from a personality disorder or mood disorder, and about 60% have additional paraphilia, like exhibitionism, voyeurism, or sadism.

To qualify for the diagnosis of a paraphilic disorder, the individual has to experience recurrent, significant sexual arousal by the object of their attraction; act on that attraction in urges, fantasies, or actions; and experience the symptoms for at least six months to the point that the individual suffers significant levels of distress or interference with his or her work, social function, or other important aspects of life.

Research on the treatment for paraphilias focuses on pedophilia, due to the terrible impact of this behavior on victims and the involvement of pedophilic sex offenders with the justice system. Those studies have shown that treatment only tends to work if the person with pedophilia is motivated and committed to controlling his or her behavior and when treatment combines psychotherapy and medication.

Psychotherapy for pedophilia and other paraphilias tends to use cognitive behavioral therapy. The focus of psychotherapy tends to be helping the person with pedophilia recognize and combat rationalizations about his or her behavior, as well as training the pedophilia sufferer in developing empathy for the victim and in techniques to control their sexual impulses. This therapy tends to take an approach to treating sexual offenders using a relapse prevention model that is similar to treating people with drug addiction. This approach tries to help the paraphilic person anticipate situations that increase their risk of sexually acting out and find ways to avoid or more productively respond to those triggers. People with paraphilia may also benefit from social skills training to help them develop age-appropriate, reciprocal relationships.

Medications that suppress the production of the male hormone testosterone reduce the frequency or intensity of sexual desire in pedophiles. It may take 3-10 months for testosterone suppression to reduce sexual desire. Studies of the effectiveness of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) in treating pedophilia and other paraphilias vary in their findings. However, SSRIs may be a helpful addition to other treatments because they tend to decrease sexual obsessiveness and urges associated with paraphilias and may help with increasing the paraphile's ability to control his or her impulses. Examples of SSRI medications include fluoxetine (Prozac), sertraline (Zoloft), paroxetine (Paxil), citalopram (Celexa), escitalopram (Lexapro), and vortioxetine (Trintellix).

There is some preliminary research that stimulant medications like methylphenidate (Ritalin) can increase the effectiveness of SSRIs, and naltrexone can decrease some of the sexual obsessiveness associated with paraphilias.

Paraphilias are quite chronic such that a minimum of 2 years of treatment is recommended for even the mildest paraphilia. While most people with paraphilia do not sexually offend, and sexual offending is not a mental illness, people who commit sexual offenses sometimes also have paraphilia.

Given that paraphilic behavior tends to be highly stigmatized and some paraphilic behaviors are illegal, tracking the success of treatments often involves rates of criminal recidivism. Therefore, prevention of future paraphilic behavior often focuses on preventing sexual offenders from having access to potential victims. Prevention of the development of any paraphilic behavior usually involves alleviating the psychosocial risk factors.

• What is an example of paraphilia? Common examples include voyeurism (watching non-consenting individuals), exhibitionism (exposing genitals), frotteurism (touching or rubbing against non-consenting people), pedophilia (sexual interest in children), and fetishism (sexual focus on non-living objects or body parts).
• Is paraphilia a mental illness? No, paraphilia is not considered a mental illness unless it causes significant distress, impairment, or harm to the individual or others as per the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5).
• Is paraphilia a crime? No, paraphilia itself is not a crime. However, certain paraphilic behaviors, such as non-consensual acts or those involving minors, may be considered illegal and vary by jurisdiction. Legal consequences can differ depending on the circumstances and severity of the actions involved.
• What paraphilias are illegal? Paraphilias are illegal when they involve non-consensual acts, exploitation, or harm. Examples include pedophilia (attraction to children), necrophilia (attraction to corpses), zoophilia (attraction to animals), voyeurism (secretly observing others without consent), exhibitionism (exposing oneself to non-consenting individuals), and frotteurism (touching or rubbing against a non-consenting person).
• What is a person with paraphilia attracted to? They are typically attracted to animals, inanimate objects, or specific body parts of humans, contrary to societal norms.