Causal attributions and male sexual arousal: The impact of attributions for a bogus erectile difficulty on sexual arousal, cognitions, and affect

After viewing 2 sexually explicit films, 52 sexually functional participant s were given bogus feedback indicating a low erectile response. The men wer e given either an external, fluctuating attribution (i.e., poor films) or a n internal, stable attribution (i.e., problematic thoughts about sex) for t he low arousal. As hypothesized, participants in the external, fluctuating group evidenced greater erectile response and subjective arousal during a 3 rd film than did participants given the internal, stable attribution. This may indicate that after an occasion of erectile difficulty, the cause to wh ich the difficulty is attributed plays an important role in future sexual f unctioning.