What Are Paraphilias?
Paraphilias are intense and persistent sexual interests for things that lay outside of "vanilla" sex between consenting adult human beings.1 This can include anything from bondage, to spanking, to feet, to abusive acts like rape and beastiality. While some people with paraphilias seek these things out in real life or in porn, it can also mean they only fantasize about it or roleplay it, or just simply find it arousing without indulging it.1
There isn’t a general consensus on what the difference between kinks, fetishes, and paraphilias are. Although, some academics believe that paraphilias involve having a “psychological dependence" on the attraction.2 If you have an occasional or mild interest in non-vanilla sex, it’s probably not a paraphilia! In fact, occasional or mild interests in these things are quite common.2
When discussing paraphilias, you may hear about the "the big three." These are the three most well-known paraphilic attractions for things that would be illegal to act upon in real life. This would be pedophilia (attraction to prepubescent children), zoophilia (attraction to animals), and necrophilia (attraction to dead bodies).
What causes paraphilias?
There's no clear answer! Some researchers theorize that signals in the brain correlating with sexual pleasure end up overlapping with signals correlating to other things.3 Another popular theory is that paraphilias are the result of conditioning; repeated exposure to a stimulus paired with sexual thoughts and behaviors causes the two to become intrisically linked. Many folks with paraphilias have also endured trauma or hardship, especially in childhood, so there are theories that paraphilias can be linked to traumatic experiences too.3
In my opinion, there is likely truth to all of these theories!
What are Paraphilic Disorders?
Paraphilic disorders are a spectrum of mental health conditions. Someone has a paraphilic disorder if their paraphilia causes themself significant distress or impairment, or puts themself or others at risk of harm.1 The goal of treatment is not to "get rid of" the paraphilia, but to help reduce the distress, impairment, and/or risk of harm that it brings.
Paraphilic disorders in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (5th edition, text revision) include:
- Voyeuristic disorder
- Exhibitionistic disorder
- Frotteuristic disorder
- Sexual masochism disorder
- Sexual sadism disorder
- Pedophilic disorder
- Fetishistic disorder
- Transvestic disorder
- Other specified paraphilic disorder
- Unspecified paraphilic disorder
References
- https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425787.x13_Sexual_Dysfunctions
- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/conditions/paraphilias
- https://scholarship.richmond.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1014&context=osmosis