Women's scores on the Sexual Inhibition/Sexual Excitation Scales (SIS/SES): Gender similarities and differences

The Sexual Inhibition/Sexual Excitation Scales (SIS/SES) assess individual propensitiesto become sexually aroused and to inhibit arousal. Prior analyses of men’s SIS/SES data(Janssen, Vorst, Finn, & Bancroft, 2002a) yielded one excitation factor (SES) and twoinhibitory factors (SIS1/Threat of Performance Failure and SIS2/Threat of PerformanceConsequences). The current study utilized a dataset of 2,045 undergraduates (1,067 women and 978 men) to examine the psychometric properties of women’s SIS/SESscores.Women scored higher on sexual inhibition and lower on sexual excitation compared withmen. The convergent/discriminant validity of women’s SIS/SES scores globally resembledmen’s, but showed stronger associations with other sexualityrelated measures and lesspronounced relationships with measures of general behavioral approach/avoidance. Thetest-retest reliability of men’s and women’s SIS/SES scores were similar, but individual items exhibited differential relevance to men’s and women’s arousal. An exploratory factor analysis of women’s scores was utilized to further examine shared and unshared themes.