Subjective and Penile Plethysmograph Responses to Aversion Therapy for Homosexuality: A Follow-up Study

¹ Senior Lecturer, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales, Sydney

Forty patients were randomly allocated to receive apomorphine aversion or aversion-relief therapy to reduce homosexual feelings. Before treatment they were shown a film containing pictures of nude women preceded by pictures of a red circle and of nude men preceded by a green triangle. The majority showed penile volume increases to the pictures of the men and decreases to the pictures of women. Corresponding conditioned penile volume changes were produced by the preceding coloured figures.

At two weeks after treatment the patients showed significantly less penile volume increase to the pictures of men and significantly more to pictures of women, i.e. a more heterosexual type of response. These changes in penile response were still present at follow-up a year or more later and correlated with the reported subjective response of the subjects to treatment. It is considered that this is evidence of the validity of both these indices of change with treatment. No consistent relationship was found between response to treatment and conditionability as measured in the film assessment.