SEXUAL SATISFACTION IN HEALTHY AGING MEN

Systematic information on the contributing factors to sexual satisfact ion in healthy older men is lacking. The central aim of the study was to explore the predictive significance of psychological, marital, and behavioral variables and their interaction on the satisfaction of heal thy married volunteers aged 45 to 74. All subjects had an extensive ps ychosexual and medical evaluation and completed a battery of psycholog ical tests which included the Derogatis Sexual Functioning Inventory ( DSFI), the Locke-Wallace Marital Adjustment Test (L-W) and the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS). Step-wise regression analysis demonstrated tha t the subjects' perception of erectile difficulties, sexual informatio n, affect, and marital adjustment had a differential correlation patte rn with three measures of sexual satisfaction explaining a substantial amount of the variance. There is a need to move beyond an exclusive f ocus on performance to the determinants of sexual enjoyment and satisf action in the later years.