The Origins of Sexual Fetishes

A sexual fetish is a sexual paraphilia (para=beyond the norm; philia=love) where the person achieves arousal and orgasm in the presence of a particular object.

Fetishes can be developed through classical conditioning.

Let's say a person has a sexual fetish for door knobs (which is possible and these type of people do exist).

Question is, how did this person develop a sexual fetish to door knobs? The situation: According to an anonymous person's case, his door knob fetish all started when he was in his pre-teens to early teens and at home. He had a strict-religious mother so during that time he would masturbate in his bedroom with his hand always tightly holding onto the door knob of his door in case his family members open his door (we would assume there was no lock on his bedroom door). After that first incident of masturbating while his hand was tightly clenching onto the door knob, he developed a sexual fetish towards door knobs and nowadays a collection of them underneath his bed. Now let's determine how this fetish of his developed through classical conditioning: US (Unconditioned Stimulus: Masturbation) —> UR (Unconditioned Response: Sexual Arousal & Orgasm) Pretty basic cause and effect. Now let's add in the neutral stimulus, which in this case is the door knob. Neutral Stimulus (door knob) + US (Masturbation) —> UR (Sexual Arousal & Orgasm) Now let's take out the unconditioned stimulus (US) and replace it with the conditioned stimulus (CS). CS (Conditioned Stimulus: door knob) —> CR (Conditioned Response: Sexual Arousal & Orgasm) As you can see, the neutral stimulus (door knob) has become the conditioned stimulus that leads to the same or similar result. The conditioned stimulus has in a sense replaced the previous stimulus or unconditioned stimulus. Masturbation is no longer needed to achieve sexual arousal towards that particular object. Seeing images of the object alone is enough to elicit a sexual response (activate sexual arousal).

Now let's apply this same concept of classical conditioning to these stimuli: porn and pedophilia (another sexual fetish). Already there are few people who privately or anonymously admitted that they developed a sexual interest towards children through viewing child porn or child-themed porn (i.e. "barely legal", "daddy's little girl", schoolgirls, "teen" porn genre). US (Porn) —> UR (Sexual Arousal & Orgasm) Neutral Stimulus (child, teenager, childlike adult) + US (Porn) —> UR (Sexual Arousal & Orgasm) CS (child, teenager, childlike adult) —> CR (sexual attraction/pedophilia) *Note that the unconditioned response and the conditioned response may not be the exact same though are similar. Conclusion: Of course, there may be other variables besides porn as to what may cause sexual fetishes but we definitely shouldn't ignore these logical findings nor people's valuable anecdotes (personal experiences). Sexual fetishes are worth doing research and quasi (ethical but uncontrollable) experiments on as they can lead to answers as to why people commit certain sex crimes or have a certain fetish that is socially unacceptable or rather immoral. —Empress Cynthelestia