Sexual desire is an emotion and motivational state characterized by an interest in sexual objects or activities, or by a drive to seek out sexual objects or to engage in sexual activities. It is an aspect of sexuality, which varies significantly from one person to another and also fluctuates depending on circumstances.
It may be the single most common sexual event in human life.
Foreplay is a set of emotionally and physically intimate acts between one or more people meant to create sexual arousal and desire for sexual activity. Although foreplay is typically understood as physical sexual activity, nonphysical activities, such as mental or verbal acts, may in some contexts be foreplay. This is typically the reason why foreplay tends to be an ambiguous term and means different things to different people. It can consist of various sexual practices such as kissing, sexual touching, removing clothes, oral sex, manual sex, sexual games, and sexual roleplay.
It serves as a critical phase in sexual encounters that heightens emotional intimacy and physical pleasure, making the sexual experience more fulfilling and satisfying.
Kama (Sanskrit: काम, IAST: kāma) is the concept of pleasure, enjoyment and desire in Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism. It can also refer to "desire, wish, longing" in Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, and Sikh literature. However, the term is also used in a technical sense to refer to any sensory enjoyment, emotional attraction or aesthetic pleasure experienced in connection with the arts, dance, music, painting, sculpture, and nature.
In contemporary literature kama is often used to connote sexual desire and emotional longing, but the ancient concept is more expansive, and broadly refers to any desire, wish, passion, pleasure, or enjoyment of art and beauty, the aesthetic, enjoyment of life, affection, love and connection, and enjoyment of love with or without sexual connotations.
Eroticism (from Ancient Greek ἔρως (érōs) 'love, desire' and -ism) is a quality that causes sexual feelings, as well as a philosophical contemplation concerning the aesthetics of sexual desire, sensuality, and romantic love. That quality may be found in any form of artwork, including painting, sculpture, photography, drama, film, music, or literature. It may also be found in advertising. The term may also refer to a state of sexual arousal or anticipation of such – an insistent sexual impulse, desire, or pattern of thoughts.
As French novelist Honoré de Balzac stated, eroticism is dependent not just upon an individual's sexual morality, but also the culture and time in which an individual resides.
Female hysteria was once a common medical diagnosis for women. It was described as exhibiting a wide array of symptoms, including anxiety, shortness of breath, fainting, nervousness, exaggerated and impulsive sexual desire, insomnia, fluid retention, heaviness in the abdomen, irritability, loss of appetite for food or sex, sexually impulsive behavior, and a "tendency to cause trouble for others". It is no longer recognized by medical authorities as a medical disorder. Its diagnosis and treatment were routine for hundreds of years in Western Europe.
In extreme cases, the woman may have been forced to enter an insane asylum or to undergo surgical hysterectomy.
Sexual attraction is attraction on the basis of sexual desire or the quality of arousing such interest. Sexual attractiveness or sex appeal is an individual's ability to attract other people sexually, and is a factor in sexual selection or mate choice. The attraction can be to the physical or other qualities or traits of a person, or to such qualities in the context where they appear. The attraction may be to a person's aesthetics, movements, voice, among other things. The attraction may be enhanced by a person's body odor, sex pheromones, adornments, clothing, perfume or hair style. It can be influenced by individual genetic, psychological, or cultural factors, or to other, more amorphous qualities. Sexual attraction is also a response to another person that depends on a combination of the person possessing the traits and on the criteria of the person who is attracted.
Though attempts have been made to devise objective criteria of sexual attractiveness and measure it as one of several bodily forms of capital asset (e.g. erotic capital), a person's sexual attractiveness is to a large extent a subjective measure dependent on another person's interest, perception, and sexual orientation. For example, a gay or lesbian person would typically find a person of the same sex to be more attractive than one of the other sex. A bisexual person would find either sex to be attractive. Asexuality refers to those who do not experience sexual attraction for either sex, though they may have romantic attraction or a non-directed libido. Interpersonal attraction includes factors such as physical or psychological similarity, familiarity or possessing a preponderance of common or familiar features, similarity, complementarity, reciprocal liking, and reinforcement.
Temperance in its modern use is defined as moderation or voluntary self-restraint. It is typically described in terms of what a person voluntarily refrains from doing. This includes restraint from revenge by practicing mercy and forgiveness, restraint from arrogance by practicing humility and modesty, restraint from excesses such as extravagant luxury or splurging, restraint from overindulgence in food and drink, and restraint from rage or craving by practicing calmness and equanimity. The distinction between temperance and self-control is subtle. A person who exhibits self-control wisely refrains from giving in to unwise desires. A person who exhibits temperance does not have unwise desires in the first place because they have wisely shaped their character in such a way that their desires are proper ones. Aristotle suggested this analogy: An intemperate person is like a city with bad laws; a person who lacks self control is like a city that has good laws on the books but doesn’t enforce them.
Temperance has been described as a virtue by religious thinkers, philosophers, and more recently, psychologists, particularly in the positive psychology movement. It has a long history in philosophical and religious thought. It is generally characterized as the control over excess, and expressed through characteristics such as chastity, modesty, humility, self-regulation, hospitality, decorum, abstinence, and forgiveness; each of these involves restraining an excess of some impulse, such as sexual desire, vanity, or anger. In classical iconography, the virtue is often depicted as a woman holding two vessels transferring water from one to another. It is one of the cardinal virtues in western thought, and is found in Greek philosophy and Christianity, as well as in Eastern traditions such as Buddhism and Hinduism.
Sexual objectification is the act of treating a person solely as an object of sexual desire (a sex object). Objectification more broadly means treating a person as a commodity or an object without regard to their personality or dignity. Objectification is most commonly examined at the level of a society (sociology), but can also refer to the behavior of individuals (psychology), and is a type of dehumanization.
Although both men and women can be sexually objectified, the concept is mainly associated with the objectification of women, and is an important idea in many feminist theories, and psychological theories derived from them. Many feminists argue that sexual objectification of girls and women contributes to gender inequality, and many psychologists associate objectification with a range of physical and mental health risks in women. Research suggests that the psychological effects of objectification of men are similar to those of women, leading to negative body image among men. The concept of sexual objectification is controversial, and some feminists and psychologists have argued that at least some degree of objectification is a normal part of human sexuality.
Asexuality is the lack of sexual attraction to others, or low or absent interest in or desire for sexual activity. It may be considered a sexual orientation or the lack thereof. It may also be categorized more widely, to include a broad spectrum of asexual sub-identities.
Asexuality is distinct from abstention from sexual activity and from celibacy, which are behavioral and generally motivated by factors such as an individual's personal, social, or religious beliefs. Sexual orientation, unlike sexual behavior, is believed to be "enduring". Some asexual people engage in sexual activity despite lacking sexual attraction or a desire for sex, for a number of reasons, such as a desire to physically please themselves or romantic partners, or a desire to have children.