Emotion Regulation in Couples Affected by Female Sexual Interest/Arousal Disorder

Predicting Sexual Desire in Daily Life from an Attachment Perspective: An Experience Sampling study

“…In the present study, the hypothesized moderating effect of emotional intimacy on the association between stress and sexual desire (Dewitte, 2012;Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007) was not found despite high statistical power (90%) (Lafit et al, 2020). A possible explanation could be that the emotion-regulation mechanism, by which stress activates intimacy needs, may be activated more frequently in distressed or dysfunctional couples than in the present healthy community sample (Brandão et al, 2019;Dub e, Corsini-Munt, Muise, & Rosen, 2019;Rick, Falconier, & Wittenborn, 2017).…”

Dialing up desire and dampening disinterest: regulating sexual desire in the bedroom and sexual and relationship well-being

“…We extend these findings by showing that amplifying desire during sex may feel sexually inauthentic, and in turn, contribute to feeling less satisfied with one's relationship. Our findings also align with the well-documented negative effects of suppression in romantic relationships (e.g., Dubé et al, 2019;Impett et al, 2012;. Consistent with research that demonstrated inauthenticity mediated the link between suppression and poorer social functioning in close relationships , our work suggests that one reason suppressing disinterest during sex specifically is linked to poorer relationship outcomes is because people feel inauthentic during the sexual encounter.…”

“…Interestingly, the opposite pattern emerged for suppression and a partner’s relationship satisfaction: when people had low sexual desire for their partner, suppressing disinterest during sex was linked to a partner’s higher relationship satisfaction. People may be somewhat effective at suppressing disinterest in the bedroom insofar as they might convince a partner that they are sexually interested and engaged—thus protecting their partner’s satisfaction—even though this concealment may not alter or even have the opposite impact on their own inner desire and satisfaction (see Dubé et al, 2019 ). Although related research found only moderate accuracy in detecting a partner’s suppression of negative emotions during daily sacrifice ( Impett et al, 2014 ), individuals may be even less attuned to their partners’ true feelings during sex compared to other relationship contexts, potentially because suppressors are convincing in the bedroom or because there are more immediate personal goals (e.g., pleasure, orgasm) present.…”

“…But to the extent that people can convincingly exhibit the level of desire they wish to portray during sex, then partners may not recognize regulation is occurring, thus protecting the partner’s satisfaction. We only know of one study that examined whether emotion suppression during a sexual encounter predicted a partner’s relationship quality in a clinical sample of women with low sexual desire ( Dubé et al, 2019 ), but no evidence of partner effects for suppression was found. Given the conceptual plausibility of such partner effects—but limited empirical evidence—we explore the possibility that one’s desire regulation during sex is also associated with a partner’s sexual and relationship outcomes.…”

“…Likewise, if people feel low desire for their partner on a given day, suppressing disinterest during sex may have an even stronger negative association with satisfaction. Indeed, a recent study found that when women coping with clinically low levels of sexual desire (or their partner) suppressed negative emotions during sexual interactions, they reported lower personal and relationship well-being ( Dubé et al, 2019 ). We investigate the nuance in how desire regulation during sex plays out in daily life by isolating its associations with sexual and relationship satisfaction on days when people feel relatively less or more sexual desire for their partner.…”