Some evidence for heightened sexual attraction under conditions of high anxiety
Abstract
Male passersby were contacted either on a fear-arousing suspension bridge or a non-fear-arousing bridge by an attractive female interviewer who asked them to fill out questionnaires containing Thematic Apperception Test pictures. Sexual content of stories written by subjects on the fear-arousing bridge and tendency of these subjects to attempt postexperimental contact with the interviewer were both significantly greater. No significant differences between bridges were obtained on either measure for subjects contacted by a male interviewer. A third study manipulated anticipated shock to male subjects and an attractive female confederate independently. Anticipation of own shock but not anticipation of shock to confederate increased sexual imagery scores on the Thematic Apperception Test and attraction to the confederate. Some theoretical implications of these findings are discussed. There is a substantial body of indirect evidence suggesting that sexual attractions occur with increased frequency during states of
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
High arousal is the common factor through changes from aversion to appetitive.
“It seems that high arousal is the common factor through changes from aversion to appetitive (Dutton and Aron, 1974).”
From A motivation model of sex addiction – Relevance to the controversy over the concept (2022) · cites this paper as Dutton and Aron, 1974
Cites
Cognitive, social, and physiological determinants of emotional state.
Schachter, S., & Singer, J. (1962) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/h0046234 · Cited by 6,223 · see citing works
Bem, D. J. (1972) · Advances in Experimental Social Psychology · doi:10.1016/s0065-2601(08)60024-6 · Cited by 5,241 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Core affect and the psychological construction of emotion.
Russell, J. A. (2003) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.110.1.145 · Cited by 6,113 · see citing works
Extensional versus intuitive reasoning: The conjunction fallacy in probability judgment.
Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1983) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.90.4.293 · Cited by 3,991 · see citing works
“Clinical versus Actuarial Judgment.”
Dawes, R. M., Faust, D., & Meehl, P. E. (1989) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.2648573 · Cited by 2,298 · see citing works
Sternberg, R. J. (1986) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.93.2.119 · Cited by 2,614 · see citing works
Support theory: a nonextensional representation of subjective probability
Tversky, A., & Koehler, D. J. (1994) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.101.4.547 · Cited by 1,167 · see citing works
Mental contamination and mental correction: Unwanted influences on judgments and evaluations.
Wilson, T. D., & Brekke, N. (1994) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/0033-2909.116.1.117 · Cited by 1,157 · see citing works
Imaginary Relish and Exquisite Torture: The Elaborated Intrusion Theory of Desire.
Kavanagh, D. J., Andrade, J., & May, J. (2005) · Psychological Review · doi:10.1037/0033-295x.112.2.446 · Cited by 956 · see citing works
Causes of sexual dysfunction: The role of anxiety and cognitive interference.
Barlow, D. H. (1986) · Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-006x.54.2.140 · Cited by 896 · see citing works
Hypnotic Disgust Makes Moral Judgments More Severe
Wheatley, T., & Haidt, J. (2005) · Psychological Science · doi:10.1111/j.1467-9280.2005.01614.x · Cited by 851 · see citing works
Dunning, D., Meyerowitz, J. A., & Holzberg, A. D. (1989) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.57.6.1082 · Cited by 758 · see citing works
Couples' shared participation in novel and arousing activities and experienced relationship quality.
Aron, A., Norman, C. C., Aron, E. N., McKenna, C., & Heyman, R. E. (2000) · Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · doi:10.1037/0022-3514.78.2.273 · Cited by 681 · see citing works
Self-citationEnglich, B., Mussweiler, T., & Strack, F. (2006) · Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin · doi:10.1177/0146167205282152 · Cited by 554 · see citing works
Emotion and Rationality: A Critical Review and Interpretation of Empirical Evidence
Pham, M. T. (2007) · Review of General Psychology · doi:10.1037/1089-2680.11.2.155 · Cited by 552 · see citing works
Affective Arousal as Information: How Affective Arousal Influences Judgments, Learning, and Memory
Storbeck, J., & Clore, G. L. (2008) · Social and Personality Psychology Compass · doi:10.1111/j.1751-9004.2008.00138.x · Cited by 382 · see citing works
An integrative theoretical framework for understanding sexual motivation, arousal, and behavior
Toates, F. (2009) · Journal of Sex Research · doi:10.1080/00224490902747768 · Cited by 339 · see citing works
Harshaw, C. (2015) · Psychological Bulletin · doi:10.1037/a0038101 · Cited by 302 · see citing works
Romantic love and sexual desire in close relationships
Gonzaga, G. C., Turner, R. A., Keltner, D., Campos, B., & Altemus, M. (2006) · Emotion · doi:10.1037/1528-3542.6.2.163 · Cited by 292 · see citing works
A Bayesian Model of Category-Specific Emotional Brain Responses
Wager, T. D., Kang, J., Johnson, T. D., Nichols, T. E., Satpute, A. B., & Barrett, L. F. (2015) · PLOS Computational Biology · doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004066 · Cited by 262 · see citing works
Brosschot, J. F. (2010) · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews · doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2010.01.004 · Cited by 197 · see citing works
The neurobiology of interoception and affect
Feldman, M. J., Bliss-Moreau, E., & Lindquist, K. A. (2024) · Trends in Cognitive Sciences · doi:10.1016/j.tics.2024.01.009 · Cited by 101 · see citing works
Wise reasoning benefits from emodiversity, irrespective of emotional intensity.
Grossmann, I., Oakes, H., & Santos, H. C. (2019) · Journal of Experimental Psychology: General · doi:10.1037/xge0000543 · Cited by 85 · see citing works
Toward a Biological Understanding of Mortality Salience (And Other Threat Compensation Processes)
Tritt, S. M., Inzlicht, M., & Harmon-Jones, E. (2012) · Social Cognition · doi:10.1521/soco.2012.30.6.715 · Cited by 60 · see citing works
A motivation model of sex addiction – Relevance to the controversy over the concept
Toates, F. (2022) · Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews · doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2022.104872 · Cited by 25 · see citing works
“It seems that high arousal is the common factor through changes from aversion to appetitive (Dutton and Aron, 1974).”
Background
- Authors
- Dutton, D. G., & Aron, A. P.
- Affiliations
- University of British Columbia (CA)
- ORCID
- Aron, Arthur P.
- Venue
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
- Published
- 1974
- Volume
- 30
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 510-517
- ISSN
- 0022-3514 (ISSN-L)
- 1939-1315
- OpenAlex
- W2149820118
- Cited by
- 934
- References
- 2
- Citations by year
- 2026: 19 · 2025: 34 · 2024: 22 · 2023: 114 · 2022: 33 · 2021: 32 · 2020: 82 · 2019: 28 · 2018: 40 · 2017: 29 · 2016: 31 · 2015: 45 · 2014: 23 · 2013: 33 · 2012: 34
- FWCI
- 4.06
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Applied Psychology › Psychological Testing and Assessment
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
- Keywords
- sexual attraction, anxiety, sexual imagery, Thematic Apperception Test, suspension bridges
- MeSH terms
- Adolescent, Adult, Anxiety, Arousal, Electroshock, Emotions, Fear, Humans, Imagination, Inhibition, Psychological, Interpersonal Relations, Libido, Male, Self Concept, Sex Factors, Stress, Psychological, Thematic Apperception Test
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
