Measurement of sexual arousal in male homosexuals: effects of instructions and stimulus modality.

Erections were measured in 20 male homosexual subjects under three instructional conditions and within three stimulus modalities. The three conditions were arousal (e.g., imagine yourself involved and get aroused), suppression (e.g., imagine yourself involved bu suppress erection responses), and rearousal (e.g., imagine yourself involved and get aroused). The three stimulus modalities studied were video tapes, slides or pictures, and audio tapes of homosexual cues. The results show that video tape generates the highest level of arousal, audio tape the lowest level of arousal, and slides an intermediate level. Both video tape and slides show substantial voluntary suppression effects. During suppression, video tape continues to elicit relatively high levels of arousal in contrast to slides and audio tapes, which are equally low.