Abstract
As part of the UCLA Family Lifestyles Project (FLS), 200 male and female children participated in an 18-year longitudinal outcome study of early childhood exposure to parental nudity and scenes of parental sexuality(“primal scenes”). At age 17-18, participants were assessed for levels of self-acceptance; relations with peers, parents, and other adults; antisocial and criminal behavior; substance use; suicidal ideation; quality of sexual relationships; and problems associated with sexual relations. No harmful "main effect" correlates of the predictor variables were found. A significant crossover Sex of Participant × Primal Scenes interaction was found such that boys exposed to primal scenes before age 6 had reduced risk of STD transmission or having impregnated someone in adolescence. In contrast, girls exposed to primal scenes before age 6 had increased risk of STD transmission or having become pregnant. A number of main effect trends in the data (nonsignificant at p < 0.05, following the Bonferonni correction) linked exposure to nudity and exposure to primal scenes with beneficial outcomes. However, a number of these findings were mediated by sex of participant interactions showing that the effects were attenuated or absent for girls. All effects were independent of family stability, pathology, or child-rearing ideology; sex of participant; SES; and beliefs and attitudes toward sexuality. Limitations of the data and of long-term regression studies in general are discussed, and the sex of participant interactions are interpreted speculatively. It is suggested that pervasive beliefs in the harmfulness of the predictor variables are exaggerated.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
REFERENCES
Abramson, P. R., and Pinkerton, S. (1995). Sexual Nature, Sexual Culture, University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Atteberry-Bennett, J. (1987). Child sexual abuse: Definitions and interventions of parents and professionals. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Department of Education, University of Virginia.
Barry, H., and Paxton, L. (1971). Infancy and early childhood: Cross-cultural codes 2. Ethnol. 10: 466–508.
Baruch, D. W. (1959). New Ways in Sex Education, McGraw Hill, New York.
Berger, B. (1977). Child-rearing research in communes: The extension of adult sexual behavior to young children. In Oremland, E. K., and Oremland, J. D. (eds.) , The Sexual and Gender Development of Young Children: The Role of the Educator, Ballinger, Cambridge, MA, pp. 159–164.
Berk, R. A., Abramson, P. R., and Okami, P. (1995). Sexual activity as told in surveys. In Abramson, P. R., and Pinkerton, S. D. (eds.), Sexual Nature, Sexual Culture, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp. 371–386.
Best, J. (1990). Threatened Children, University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
Bottfeld, S. (1992, December-January). Emotional sexual abuse. Gateway, 18–19, 35.
Bolton, F. G. Jr., Morris, L. A., and MacEachron, A. E. (1989). Males at Risk: The Other Side of Child Sexual Abuse, Sage, Newbury Park, CA.
Brecher, E. M., and Brecher, J. (1986). Extracting valid sexological findings from severely flawed and biased population samples. J. Sex Res. 22: 6–20.
Buss, D. M. (1994). The Evolution of Desire, Basic Books, New York.
Buss, D. M. (1995). Evolutionary psychology: A New paradigm for psychological science. Psychol. Inq. 6: 1–30.
Caudhill, W., and Plath, D. W. (1966). Who sleeps by whom? Parent-child involvement in urban Japanese families. Psychiatry 29: 344–366.
Cohen, J. (1994). The earth is round (p < 0.05). Am. Psychol. 49: 997–1003.
Dahl, G. (1982). Notes on critical examinations of the primal scene concept. J. Am. Psychiat. Assoc. 30: 657–677.
DeCecco, J. P., and Shively, M. G. (1977). Children's development: Social sex-role and the hetero-homosexual orientation. In Oremland, E. K., and Oremland, J. D. (eds.), The Sexual and Gender Development of Young Children: The Role of the Educator, Ballinger, Cambridge, MA, pp. 89–90.
Eiduson, B. T. (1983). The conflict and stress in nontraditional families: Impact on children. Am. J. Orthpsychiat. 53: 526–535.
Ellis, B., and Symons, D. (1990). Sex differences in sexual fantasy: An evolutionary psychological approach. J. Sex Res. 27: 527–555.
Esman, A. H. (1973). The primal scene: A review and a reconsideration. Psychanal. Quart. 28: 49–81.
Finch, S. (1982). Viewing other-sex genitals. Med. Aspects Hum. Sex. 16: 72.
Furstenberg, F., Brooks-Gunn, J., and Morgan, S. (1987). Adolescent Mothers in Later Life, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, MA.
Gardner, R. A. (1975). Exposing children to parental nudity. Med. Aspects Hum. Sex. 10: 115–116.
Gold, S. R., and Gold, R. G. (1991). Gender differences in first sexual fantasies. J. Sex Educ. Ther. 17: 207–216.
Goodson, A. (1991). Therapy, Nudity, and Joy, Elysium Growth Press, Los Angeles.
Hartman, W. E., Fithian, M., and Johnson, D. (1991). Nudist Society, 2nd ed., Elysium Growth Press, Los Angeles.
Haynes-Seman, C., and Krugman, R. D. (1989). Sexualized attention: Normal interaction or precursor to sexual abuse? Am. J. Orthopsychiat. 59: 238–245.
Hollingshead, A. B. (1975). Four Factor Index of Social Position, Yale University, New Haven, CT.
Hoyt, M. F. (1978). Primal scene experiences as recalled and reported by college students. Psychiatry 41: 57–71.
Hoyt, M. F. (1979). Primal-scene experiences: Quantitative assessment of an interview study. Arch. Sex. Behav. 8: 225–245.
Huba, G. J., and Bentler, P. M. (1982). A developmental theory, of drug use: Derivation and assessment of a causal modeling approach. In Baltes, P. B., and Brim, O. G., Jr. (eds.) , Life-Span Development and Behavior, Vol. 4, Academic Press, New York, pp. 147–203.
Johnston, C. M., and Deisher, R. W. (1973). Contemporary communal child rearing: A first analysis. Pediatrics 51: 319–326.
Justice, B., and Justice, R. (1979). The Broken Taboo, Human Sciences, New York.
Kirkendall, L. A., and McBride, L. G. (1990). Preadolescent and adolescent imagery and sexual fantasies: Beliefs and experiences. In Perry, M. E. (ed.), Handbook of Sexology, Vol 7: Childhood and Adolescent Sexology, Elsevier, New York, pp. 263–286.
Knoth, R., Boyd, K., and Singer, B. (1988). Empirical tests of sexual selection theory: Predictions of sex differences in onset, intensity, and time course of sexual arousal. J. Sex Res. 24: 73–79.
Kritsberg, W. (1993). The Invisible Wound: A New Approach to Healing Childhood Sexual Trauma, Bantam, New York.
Krug, R. S. (1989). Adult male report of childhood sexual abuse by mothers: Case descriptions, motivations and long-term consequences. Child Abuse Neg. 13: 111–119.
Lewis, R. J., and Janda, L. H. (1988). The relationship between adult sexual adjustment and childhood experiences regarding exposure to nudity, sleeping in the parental bed, and parental attitudes toward sexuality. Arch. Sex. Behav. 17: 349–362.
Lozoff, B., Wolf, A. W., and Davis, N. S. (1984). Co-sleeping in urban families with young children in the United States. Pediatrics 74:171–182.
Martinson, F. M. (1977). Eroticism in childhood: A sociological perspective. In Oremland, E.K., and Oremland, J. D. (eds.) , The Sexual and Gender Development of Young Children: The Role of the Educator, Ballinger, Cambridge, MA, pp. 73–82.
Mead, M. (1967). Male and Female: A Study of the Sexes in a Changing World, William Morrow, New York.
Morelli, G. A. Rogoff, B., Oppenheim, D., and Goldsmith, D. (1992). Culture variations in infant's sleeping arrangement s: Questions of independence. Dev. Psychol. 28: 604–613.
Moore, M. M. (1995). Courtship signaling and adolescents: “Girls just want to have fun”? J. Sex Res. 32: 319–328.
Newcomb, M. D., Huba, G. J., and Bentler, P. M. (1983). Mother's influence on the drug use of their children: Confirmatory tests of direct modeling and mediational theories. Dev. Psychol. 19: 714–726.
Oleinick, M. S., Bahn, A. K., Eisenberg, L., and Lilienfield, A. M. (1966). Early socialization experiences. Arch. Gen. Psychiat. 15: 1966.
Okami. P. (1995). Childhood exposure to parental nudity, parent-child co-sleeping, and “primal scenes”: A review of clinical opinion and empirical evidence. J. Sex Res. 32: 51–64.
Okami, P., Olmstead, R., and Abramson, P. R. (1997). Sexual experiences in early childhood: 18-year data from the UCLA Family Life-styles Project. J. Sex Res. 34: 339–347.
Peltz, M. (1977). Sexual and gender development in nursery school years. In Oremland, E.K., and Oremland, J. O. (eds.) , The Sexual and Gender Development of Young Children: The role of the Educator, Ballinger, Cambridge, MA, pp. 39–49.
Rosenfeld, A. A., Smith, C. R., Wenegrat, M. A., Brewster, M. A., and Haavik, D. K. (1980). The primal scene: A study of prevalence. Ann. J. Psychiat. 137: 1426–1428.
Rind, B., and Tromovitch, P. (1997). A meta-analytic review of findings from national samples on psychological correlates of child sexual abuse. J. Sex Res. 34: 237–255.
Scarr, S., Phillips. D., and McCartney, K. (1990). Facts, fantasies, and the future of child care in the United States, Psychol. Sci. 1: 26–33.
Schmidt, F. (1996). APA Board of Scientific Affairs to study issue of significance testing, make recommendations. The Score 19: 1, 6.
Smith, D. C., and Sparks, W. (1986). The Naked Child: Growing Up Without Shame, Elysium Growth Press, Los Angeles.
Solnit, A. J. (1977). Sexual and gender development in the context of the family, school, and society. In Oremland, E. K., and Oremland, J. O. (eds.), The Sexual and G ender Development of Young Children: The Role of the Educator, Ballinger, Cambridge, MA, pp. 3–10.
Spock, B. (1945). The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, Duell, Sloan and Pearce, New York.
Sroufe, A. L., and Fleeson, J. (1986). Attachment and the construction of relationships. In Hartup, W. W., and Rubin, Z. (eds.), Relationships and Development, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, pp. 51–71.
Stephens, W. (1972). Across-cultural study of modesty. Behav. Sci. Notes 7: 1–28.
Stevens-Simon, C., and White, M. (1991). Adolescent pregnancy. Pediat. Ann. 20: 322–331.
Story, M. D. (1979). Factors associated with more positive body self-concepts in preschool children. J. Soc. Psychol. 108: 49–56.
Symons, D. (1979). The Evolution of Human Sexuality, Oxford University Press, New York.
Symons, D. (1995). Beauty is in the adaptations of the beholder: The evolutionary psychology of human female sexual attractiveness. In Abramson, P., and Herdt, G. (eds.), Sexual Nature, Sexual Culture, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, pp 80–120.
Tooby, J., and Cosmides, L. (1992). The psychological foundations of culture. In Barkow, J.H., Cosmides, L., and Tooby, J. (eds.), The Adapted Mind: Evolutionary Psychology and the Generation of Culture, Oxford University Press, New York, pp. 19–36.
Trussell, J. (1988). Teenage pregnancy in the United States. Fam. Plann. Perspect. 20: 262–273.
Weisner, T. S. (1986). Implementing new relationship styles in American families. In Hartup, W. W., and Rubin, Z. (eds.), Relationships and Development, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NJ, pp. 185–206.
Weisner, T. S., Bausano, M., and Kornfein, M. (1983). Putting family ideals into practice: Pro-naturalism in conventional and nonconventional California families. Ethos 11: 278–304.
Weisner, T. S., and Garnier, H. (1992). Nonconventional family life-styles and school achievement: A 12-year longitudinal study. Am. Educ. Res. J. 29: 605–632.
Weisner, T. S., and Wilson-Mitchell, J. E. (1990). Nonconventional family life-styles and sex typing in six-year-olds. Child Dev. 61: 1915–1933.
Whiting, B. B. (1964). The effects of climate on certain cultural practices. In Goodenough, W. H. (ed.), Explorations in Anthropology: Essays in Honor of George Peter Murdoch, Publisher, City, pp. 511–541.
Whiting, B. B., and Edwards, C. (1988). Children of Different Worlds: The Formation of Social Behavior, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA.
Willis, E. (1986 October 28). A modest proposal. The Village Voice, p. 19.
Wolf, A. P. (1995). Sexual Attraction and Childhood Association, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Okami, P., Olmstead, R., Abramson, P.R. et al. Early Childhood Exposure to Parental Nudity and Scenes of Parental Sexuality (“Primal Scenes”): An 18-Year Longitudinal Study of Outcome. Arch Sex Behav 27, 361–384 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018736109563
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018736109563