Background
• Romantic attachment shapes sexual behavior and its motivation in adult relationships
(Davis, Shaver, & Vernon, 2004). Although attachment theory does not propose different
motivational dynamics for men and women, sexual behavior is still gender specific
because of both biological and cultural factors (for details see Petersen & Hyde, 2010). In
addition, previous studies have demonstrated that self-esteem is also partially associated
with sexual behavior. For example, self-esteem, regardless of pubertal status, predicted
coitus transition differentially in boys and girls (Spencer, Zimet, Aalsma, & Orr, 2002).
• Sexual behavior is motivated by different goals or needs (appetitive/approach or
aversive/avoidance motives in general). There is evidence that people with high
attachment avoidance reported having sex as an attempt to make an impression to their
peers, whereas those with high attachment anxiety using sex to decrease their feeling of
relationship insecurity (Schachner & Shaver, 2004).
• Next, attachment anxiety was positively related to a whole range of sexual motives, with
the exception of physical pleasure; avoidance is positively connected with manipulative
use of sex and negatively related to emotional closeness and reassurance as a goals of sex
(Davis, Shaver, &Vernon, 2004).
• Davis and his colleagues (2004) proposed that attachment anxiety is related to selfesteem
enhancement motive for sex (measured as enhacement of sexual self-esteem).
Role of global self-esteem is unclear in sexual motivation context.
The aim of the study
The purpose of this study is to examine the relation between attachment and sexual
motivation taking into account the roles of global self-esteem and gender in emerging adults.
Method
Sample comprizes 581 Czech emerging adults (96 male, mean age=22.72; SD=1.29) who are
currently in a relationship and participate in a 5-years longitudinal study Paths to adulthood.
Data used here come from the 5th wave of the study carried out in summer 2014.
Romantic attachment - Experiences in Close Relationships-Relationships Structures (Fraley
et al. 2011); 6 items attachment avoidance (α=.87) and 3 items anxiety (α=.87).
Global self-esteem - Rosenberg Self-esteem Scale (Rosenberg, et al. 1995); 7 items (α=.89).
Motives for having sex - Perceived Locus of Causality for Sex Scale (Jenkins, 2004); 12 items
intrinsic (α=.91), 9 items extrinsic (α=.89), 7 items expression of intimity (α=.88), 4 items selfenhacement
(α=.81), and 4 items identified motives (α=.79).
Descriptives
Institute for the Research on Children,Youth, and Family
Masaryk University Brno, Czech Republic
Lenka Lacinová, Stanislav Ježek,Tomo Umemura, & Petr Macek
lacinova@fss.muni.cz
Romantic attachment and motivation for sex in emerging adulthood:
Do gender and self-esteem matter?
Motivation for sex 1
Sex feels good
intrinsic, internal appetitive
motive
e.g. Because I feel it is
stimulating and enjoyable.
Motivation for sex 2
Sex is
a sacrifice to my
partner
extrinsic, social aversive
motive
e.g. Because I feel anxious
or guilty if I don’t go along.
Motivation for sex 3
Sex is
the expression
of intimity
social appetitive motive
e.g. For the pleasure of
sharing a special and
intimate experience.
Motivation for sex 4
Sex makes me
feel better
self-enhancement motive
e.g. Because I think sex
makes me feel better
about myself.
Motivation for sex 5
Sex is
good in general
identified motive
e.g. Because I see sex as a
healthy activity.
Conclusions
(1) Both attachment dimensions and global self-esteem are weakly associated with different
motivations to have sex with different pattern of relationships form males and females.
(2) Males’ motivations to have sex do not seem to be related to their self-esteem. In females,
higher self-esteem slightly increases intrinsic motivations and decreases extrinsic
motivation.
(3) Attachment dimensions seem to affect males’ motivation to have sex more than females’
motivation. However, especially here the question of the direction of causality comes to
mind.
Females Males
N M SD N M SD AV AX S-E SM1 SM2 SM3 SM4 SM5
ECR-R AVoidance 433 1.79 .90 88 2.22 .97 .16 -.15 -.12 .24 -.33 .11 -.11
ECR-R AnXiety 433 2.41 1.40 88 2.46 1.32 .32 -.33 .23 .33 .16 .20 .24
Self-Esteem 414 3.08 .59 85 3.13 .59 -.18 -.32 -.13 -.13 -.02 -.19 -.15
SexMot1 451 3.30 .77 90 3.56 .75 -.12 -.04 .14 .04 .41 .57 .67
SexMot2 452 1.75 .71 90 1.77 .59 .18 .24 -.25 -.29 -.05 .36 .08
SexMot3 452 3.94 .79 90 3.88 .83 -.28 -.09 .18 .50 -.33 .17 .52
SexMot4 451 1.84 .81 90 2.18 .89 .04 .15 -.03 .51 .11 .26 .45
SexMot5 456 3.34 .88 90 3.60 .98 -.10 .04 .10 .62 -.02 .42 .46
Females below diagonal, males above diagonal
This presentation is supported
by the Czech Science Foundation (project
“Paths to Adulthood”, GAP407/12/0854).
About the SEM models
• Five structurally equivalent
multigroup models (by gender)
were estimated in Mplus 7 – one
model for each sex motivation.
• Measurement part fixed across
groups, structural part free.
• S-E and sex motivation items
analyzed as categorical –WLSMV
was used as the estimator.
• Pictograms on the right show
standardized structural
coefficients for S-E,AV, andAX
and explained variance in SM.