11 Comments to 'Sex and the Mental Age'
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Sex and the Mental Age
Posted By avi
[Update: 10/1/2006 -- Rep. Foley (R) Florida again reminds us that we're not really dealing with the issue of Pedophilia, except maybe on the sentencing side. The GOP leadership in the House knew about this for a year and kept it quiet. Something has to change.]
Previously:
There are theories of human development that could be applied to understanding why some people are conservative vs. liberal and separately, to the existence of pedophilia in our society. The question I have is whether the causes are at all related.
On the first item, a Berkeley study concluded that conservatives were “whinier” as children, more self-centered, more demanding. The liberal kids were more socially adept. But to me, this isn’t about whether liberal kids are better people than conservatives. It’s about the time-line of mental development.
We all grew from small whiny poop machines to our present selves. The vast majority of us went through similar stages: learning to express our needs (crying, screaming, asking), manipulating our parents, to hopefully learning to form relationships that mutually meet our needs. The path from childhood to adulthood is not one of a pre-set personality that just gets bigger with time, but an evolution of the self in a dynamic environment. “Conservatism,” IMO, is analogous to a prolonged focus on our own material needs, what’s mine is mine, and it’s not surprising this is often accompanied by a deep spiritual hunger (often fed through organized religion). But at some point, even the most ardent conservatives may learn to feed some of that hunger with altruism, tolerance, and a feeling of collective responsibility, or what I’d call “Liberalism.” In spiritual terms, it’s akin to becoming more Christ-like, or in other faiths, moving up from the base survival Chakras to the more spiritual centers. It’s a long path to follow in any one lifetime.
The question I have about some conservatives (and I stress some — I’m focused on the ones who seek power, and perhaps the ones who drive their SUVs like they own the road) is whether their development was somehow delayed from other kids. As I read the Berkeley study, it seems to say so. As I look at some actual conservatives in positions of power, I find it doubly true. The hallmarks of stunted emotional development are manipulative behaviors, judgemental hypocrisy, and a level of self-serving that only succeeds by deceiving the folks they repeatedly screw. Essentially, they screw the country and rationalize they’re doing it for our own good and we like it. But the reality is that this is a way for a person who desperately seeks power to achieve that power over other people. Tom DeLay is a good example of this, as is El Presidente Bush. The scary thing about our dear Pat Robertson is that he seems to actually believe that God smites whole towns based on Pat’s agenda — the intentional deception may be low (or not), but so is the mental age. And if you asked me about Bill O’Reily’s mental age, I’d guess 13. (Shut up!)
But mental age has a sexual component too, and that’s the main reason I’m writing this post. There’s a school of thought that says we seek sexual partners who are our own mental age. This, for biological/evolutionary reasons, means that a 40 year old man should typically find a 40 year old woman attractive despite the fact that a 20 year old man might not (no judgement on Beauty–I’m closer to 40). But it’s not about physical or even apparent age, but mental, emotional, and developmental age. That same 40 year old man might seek a 20 year old woman if his emotional development peaked or stopped around that point. It’s also one of the reasons teenage girls go for older boys — they’re typically further along in their emotional development and vice-versa. And being emotionally stunted at a lower-than-actual age doesn’t necessarily stop someone from having a fairly typical life, even from having a family. But it does severely impact their ability to have meaningful, lasting relationships (see national divorce rate).
So what happens when someone’s emotional development is stunted at very young age? This, I believe, is the basis for pedophilia. While pro-pedophile activists will say that adult/child liasons are consensual, it’s pretty clear to the rest of us that children can’t give true consent and any such “relationship” is fundamentally exploitative. Fifty years of life experience against 5 can not be consensual, though both the victim and perpetrator may be at similar stages of emotional development (see Michael Jackson or the Church Sex scandal). But this is how many pedophiles reconcile their behavior as “okay.” Essentially, they screw up the kid and rationalize they’re doing it for his own good and that he or she likes it. But the reality is that this is a way for a person who desperately seeks power to achieve that power over someone who can’t fight back. (does any of that sound familiar?)
It might still seem a stretch to more directly link pedophilia to conservatism, and I’m definitely not claiming political conservatism causes pedophelia in any way. But there may be something of a common developmental “root cause” for both. There certainly does seem to be an unfortunate statistical spike among conservatives of power and influence, where laws and morals may seem a bit more “abstract.” There’s an old truism in Washington: a liberal sex scandal means hookers or interns; a conservative one means anything else. Consider this list from the DailyKos universe. I’m sure there’s a proportionate number of bad acts by certain Dems. But among these Republicans, crimes involving children are much more common than anyone should expect. There’s the case of Boys Town which went down quietly beside the whole Church Sex scandal (some call it a political cover-up). And now there’s a high-ranking DHS politico charged with underage sex solicitation.
For people who seek power, who may believe themselves superior to the “sheeple” they “serve” (as indicated by an apparent contempt for certain democratic institutions, like “elections” and “law”), and who may be severely stunted in their own emotional development to the point of being attracted to children, the temptation to act may be too great. Certainly, it’s another old truism that the more vehement the anti-gay crusader, the more likely it is he’s in the closet and in denial. Is it possible that some of the strongest “Family Values” crusaders, who forced “no child left behind” on public schools and then defunded the program, and who speak till red in the face about the Sins of Others, might be covering up for their own deficiencies?
The focus, I think, should be on understanding the problem, talking about it, and getting help for people who are just like us in other respects. But as long as we treat the problem with a typical conservative response (ignore it until it overwhelms us and then declare War — often on the wrong enemy) kids will continue to suffer and nothing in Washington, or Boys Town, will change.
Oct 1st, 2006
Bravo. I’ve always considered social conservatism more of a personality flaw than a political ideology. I’m glad there’s some hard science behind it. Most intriguing.
Hasn’t the “emotional age” argument been used to claim gays are also stunted?
I think this misimpression comes from hearing about male pedophiles abusing boys and assuming that implies homosexuality (it may or may not–I don’t think we really know how many boys vs. girls are abused anyway…). I think there’s also a fear among some that gays are as emotionally repressed as the people who attack them (see homophoia). I’m positive that those who openly accept their orientation and have good adult relationships are as likely to be as emotionally developed as anyone else. On the other hand, being in life-long denial seems like it could be a big emotional retarder, and coming out may be a key step forward. Also consider that extreme social persecution could just as easily help accelerate someone’s emotional development as confound it, depending on how they handle it and what support they have.
As much as it might please me to think of conservatives as emotionally immature, I’m wary of trying to equate the two. (In fact, part of my wariness arises from the fact that such a conclusion might be gratifying.)
It’s often observed that people become more conservative as they get older. They become less idealistic and more cynical; they’ve been burned too many times. (There’s an old joke about a conservative being nothing more than a liberal who’s been mugged.) A lot of people have their peak of political activism in college, when they’re both idealistic and energetic, and as they grow older (and gain greater financial responsibilities), they gradually come to regard their earlier actions as naive. Are such people becoming less mature with age? I’d have to hear more argument to be convinced.
Regarding Republicans screwing over the country, it’s tempting to think this reflects something intrinsic about Republican ideology, but then I’m reminded that when Democrats controlled Congress, Democratic corruption was more common. It may be that corruption is a greater problem in whichever party has the majority (”power corrupts”).
The question of emotional age and sexual partners is complicated, too. There are so many factors that go into choice of partner that I think it’d be hard to identify a pattern tied to emotional age. Did Anna Nicole Smith marry an 89-year-old man because of her incredible emotional maturity? Probably not.
I’m also wary of linking emotional age with pedophilia. Is there any evidence that pedophiles behave in an immature fashion across the board? Do they throw tantrums? Are they unable to do anything that requires long-term planning? If not, then it may be more fruitful to regard pedophilia as its own pathology, distinct from arrested emotional development. And not all pedophiles are self-justifying; many pedophiles are aware that their behavior is wrong, but are unable to stop their compulsive behavior. In this regard, pedophilia resembles other sexual pathologies.
Interesting points, Ted.
I’m sure there are a number of dimensions to emotional development. I’m admittedly generalizing to "mental age." But sexual development isn’t the same as emotional, social, intellectual, or a handful of others we could probably distinguish. But on just one narrow point, I’d guess the 89-year old man was the one with the lower mental age (sexually, at least), whereas Anna Nicole Smith was more likely attracted to his money…
Anyway, pedophilia may have more to do with a stunted sexual development. Those who don’t understand the effects of their actions on others are probably emotionally undeveloped at the very least. Those who can’t control themselves may have other issues. There may be multiple dimensions to maturity, but extremes in more than one dimension may multiply in effect, so the person who has stunted emotional and sexual development has a double whammy of predisposition.
As for people growing more conservative over time, that may be true for some. But many people grow less self-centered and more community-oriented over time. Any growing conservatism may have more to do with simply having more stuff to lose than a change in ideology. The common trait may be that people seem to become less idealistic and more nuanced in their views of life and what’s important. Or perhaps they grow cynical as you say. But individual life experience may have the most to do with what direction that takes.
In the group I’m looking at–those who seek power–I can’t think of any that started out liberal and grew conservative over time. At most, they became more pragmatic. Your point about corruption is the key one though — and people who sought power in the first place may be doubly prone to it. It’s the link between that power-seeking, a possible problem in sexual development, plus a lack of emotional awareness of one’s impact on other people that can all combine in the perfect storm of the conservative leader who rallies over family values and then molests kids, which seems to be more common than it should otherwise be.
My general point is that I’m not sure the idea of mental/emotional age is a useful tool in understanding these phenomena. How does marrying someone for his/her beauty indicates a lower mental age than marrying someone for his/her wealth? Would pedophilia indicate a lower mental age than a gambling addiction or sex addiction? Why do you think that individuals who become more community-oriented over time are better representatives of increasing emotional age than those who become less community-oriented?
Youth may be associated with a variety of bad/undesirable behaviors, but it doesn’t necessarily follow that those behaviors in adults are indicative of a low mental age. There is also the oft-noted distinction between the words “childish” and “childlike”; one is derogatory while the other is not. There are adults who enjoy spontaneous play and are full of wonder; do we want to say they have a low mental age?
I fully support exposing hypocrisy in public figures, and it may be an effective rhetorical tactic to compare such behavior with an angelic-faced child getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar. I just don’t know that the resemblance actually reflects an underlying psychological reality.
Marrying someone purely for wealth or beauty are both probably less than mature behaviors. My point was that Anna Nicole Smith was not, in the straw-man suggestion, demonstrating 80 year old maturity, but both parties were likely immature.
Anyway, I’m not sure we can compare pedophilia and addictive behaviors that are primarily self-destructive (though they may easily grow to harm loved ones in other ways). Pedophilia requires the perpetrator to fail to grasp (or not care about) the harm he/she does to helpless victims. Even if he/she feels guilty, the failure to seek help for "poor impulse control" (if that’s all it is) is a sign of a lack of emotional development. We learn coping mechanisms for our impulses and we learn to seek help when we need it. If someone hasn’t ever learned, that’s another way of saying they’re under-developed in those areas.
Ted, I think you may be taking the mental age argument more literally than is meant. I imagine someone with under-developed emotional skills could still seem very mature in social circles, be very personable, but yet have severe problems in their private relationships (e.g., bad communication, bad coping skills, unrealistic expectations of others…). A child could be very advanced in his relationships and yet still play and be a goof, as can an adult be childlike at times without lowering their mental age. Maybe that’s too complex, and to pick one "mental age" is admittedly a generalization. But the behaviors I’d look at most closely relate to how a person meets his or her emotional needs–through force, coercion, deception, or by building mature reciprocal relationships? And that’s where the power-seekers come in. They seem stuck with the manipulative behaviors, or in some case, outright force. That’s where I think the connection lies.
As for the connection of that to conservatism, I think the berkeley study above has some interesting leads. We can try to debate those points if you wish.
Sorry if I misread your argument. Let me ask you this: is there any sort of bad/antisocial behavior that you would not describe as resulting from under-development in a certain area? To put it another way, is bad/antisocial behavior synonymous with stunted emotional growth, in your terms?
The Berkeley study is definitely interesting, although I read it more as identifying two different personality types, rather than two different developmental stages.
The children who grew up to become conservatives were described “as uncomfortable with uncertainty, as susceptible to a sense of guilt, and as rigidifying when experiencing duress”; also “They tended toward indecisiveness, were easy butts of peers, and were quiet, neat, compliant, fearful and tearful, hoping for help from the adult surround.”
The children who grew up to become liberal are described as “resourceful, autonomous, expressive, and self-reliant,” as well as “talkative and dominating, aggressive and teasing, brightly fluent, with high standards, and judgmental of peers.”
(I have to admit, my childhood self would definitely have fallen in the former category, even though I fall on the liberal end of the spectrum on every issue I can think of.)
As a very broad generalization, these sound to me like introvert and extrovert personality types. While some introverts do “come out of their shell” as they grow older, I don’t think of introversion and extroversion as being different stages of development.
I wouldn’t be surprised if introversion were correlated with various forms of sexual deviance, so if introversion is in fact correlated with political conservatism, it might be expected that sexual deviants would tend to be conservatives. I don’t want to jump to any conclusions, though.
Very interesting. I’ve tried to avoid resorting to the "nature vs. nurture" debate, but it seems unavoidable here. My experience is that it’s always a mix — that we may be predisposed to certain personality traits (good or bad), but we also develop as a reflection of our environment and even our own active steering.
So to answer your question, "bad/antisocial" is not a synonym for "stunted emotional growth" per se, but may easily be a result of it. Put another way, certain negative circumstances may help steer someone’s long-term development towards the "antisocial," whereas someone else, even in the same circumstances, may learn more effective coping mechanisms and become what we’d call "well adjusted."
I’m more focused on that learning/growing element, since what the hell can we do about the innate stuff, except accept it and possibly get past it? This is also where I’d alightly disagree with the study author’s interpretation of their data (without disputing the data itself or your excellent summary). I think the authors are largely in the "nature" camp, whereas I invoked a "nurture" explanation for how we develop into liberal or conservative adults.
Debating nature vs. nurture is usually a pointless move without hard evidence. But someone can easily argue with my claim that liberalism is more emotionally developed than conservatism (despite the similarities in conservatism to stages of childhood development, theories of "self-actualization," and various spiritual paths from animal to enlightenment).
As for introversion vs. extroversion, there may be elements that are more innate (e.g., whether social activity is energizing or draining…). But the aspect we’d call "shyness" can definitely be overcome with some work. I’ve had to deal with lots of introversion issues myself. And I can see a lot of this developmental path theory in my own life. As I grow into family life, I can also see the pull towards conserving for my family’s sake vs. the old idealism. But for me, liberalism was never so much about conscientious ideals as it was a recognition that many liberal approaches are simply more effective as society-wide "coping mechanisms" — if society can be seen as a single collective personality, then how do we help it grow up? The notion of "every man for himself" makes about as much sense in this context as "every neuron for itself" in the individual. And letting our country grow up conservative makes as much sense as spoiling a child and teaching him to be a bully.
Is it me, or are the replies to replies getting longer than the original blog entry? Maybe I should start a new post soon.
I hadn’t thought about the question in terms of nature/nurture; I agree that both factors are involved in almost everything. I’m not sure that the Berkeley study really says anything about nature/nurture; it doesn’t specifically control for either.
(One final note regarding pedophilia: based on this page, it seems that there is wide variation in this category, and it might be difficult to generalize about the group as a whole.)
You say your own political orientation grew out of “a recognition that many liberal approaches are simply more effective.” I too favor liberal approaches, but I sometimes wonder how much any of our political stances are really the result of objective assessment of the evidence. There are people who claim to have adopted conservative stances for the same reason, and I don’t think all of them are deluded.
I only had time to skim that link, but it seems very informative. Thanks, I thought the table comparing incest to pedophilia was very compelling.
Anyway, I should say that I do also see a lot of validity in some typically conservative stances, like empowering people vs. creating structural dependencies. Actually, I’ve never heard anyone prefer structural dependencies, though they happen. The problems come in the details, I guess. On one side, raw greed drives privitization, and on the other, bureaucratic incompetence ruins what might otherwise be good social safety nets.