Do you know what is asexual in Psychology? Actually, knowledge about sexuality can be obtained if we often find out about topics related to it. Luckily, in this digital era, we will be able to access all types of information from the internet. Well, here we are going to discuss about asexuality in Psychology.
Definition of Asexual
Asexuality is a term for a person who does not have a sexual attraction to other people. Probably, this sound strange, because as far as we know, even from Abraham Maslow’s popular theory of basic needs, the need for sexual intercourse with another person is at the bottom of his hierarchy of needs, including physiological needs (Kenrick et al., 2010).
One of Psychoanalysts, Sigmund Freud, also emphasized that sexual exploration is one of the stages of human psychological development from childhood to adulthood, which is called the stage of psychosexual development. According to Sigmund Freud, there are five stages of psychosexual development; oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital. The most decisive peak in the exploration of human sexuality is the genital stage that occurs at the age of 20s, where a person has maturely controlled his sexual desires and is ready to have a relationship with another person fully, not only based on the satisfaction of desire (McLeod, 2019). Also, Sigmund Freud emphasized that the satisfaction of sexual desire is a healthy thing. He argued that if a person does not satisfy his sexual desire, then there will be developmental delays in that person (Lantz & Ray, 2020).
Asexuality: Sexual Disturbance or Orientation?
Asexuality is a person’s disinterest in sexual activity. However, some asexual people engage in sexual activity even though they have no sexual interest or desire to have sex, for various reasons, namely to please themselves or their partner, or the desire to have children (Nicole & Graham, 2004). Also, it is not uncommon for someone who has no sexual desire to seek guidance from a medical perspective and can be diagnosed with hypoactive sexual desire disorder or the psychological disorder of sexual aversion, or can be referred for a medical evaluation.
Thus, asexuality can be applied to heterosexual, bisexual, or homosexual people. So far, no research has found the exact cause of asexuality, and whether this condition lasts for life, or is obtained from certain experiences (Nicole & Graham, 2004). However, recent researches also mention that asexuality has been considered a lifelong condition, but only about 0.5 to 1% of the population report a lack of sexual attraction, and many of those who do not experience sexual attraction may still not identify as asexual, despite meeting these criteria (O’Sullivan, 2018). Another recent debate among the researchers is whether asexuality can be categorized into another sexual orientation, or label it a disorder (Cavendish, 2010; Bogaert, 2015).
Asexuality in the 2010s
In the 2010s, discussions about raising awareness of sexuality were popular. There is a difference between asexual and aromatics or individuals who are not interested in romantic relationships with other people. Asexual individuals are not uninterested in romantic relationships, but rather the absence of sexual desire for their partners, even having the choice to have sex with other people, but only based on curiosity or because they want to enjoy it (Duncan, 2019). It is reported by a research data in the United States, that asexual individuals are less likely to have sex in the last five years, compared to non-asexual men and women (Rothblum, et al., 2020).
Asexuality is often equated with hypoactive sexual disorder, which is a mental and biological disorder. But asexuality has characteristics which are not included in hypoactive sexual disorder, namely the relationship of hypoactive sexual disorder with trauma and the unwillingness to explore intimate relationships with someone, causing mental stress to the person experiencing it, while asexual individuals still have the desire to explore intimate relationships, but do not. be sexually active and do not feel pressured for not doing it (American Sexual Health Association, 2020).
Based on the latest data, the population of asexual individuals in the world is very small, amounting to 4%, which is mostly dominated by individuals aged 18-24 years (GLAAD, 2017). Nevertheless, one thing to note is that the data and research on asexuality still refers to the population in the United States, so it still cannot represent the prevalence of asexual individuals in the world. Thus, we highly suggest to do further research on asexuality in terms of various scientific perspectives, not only from psychology, but also from the perspective of medicine, social, economics, and various cultures, because all human behavior, not to mention sexual behavior, is not only influenced by genetics, but also by the social and cultural situation of the people.
A bookworm and researcher especially related to law and citizenship education. I spend time every day in front of the internet and the campus library.
