Performance Anxiety In Sexual Dysfunctions

Among the psychological factors that prevent us from having an adequate sexual response, we find performance anxiety. Thus, in colloquial terms, we could say that performance anxiety arises when we worry too much about our performance in the context of a sexual relationship.

Thus, performance anxiety is a type of anxiety that appears and is maintained by expectations regarding a particular situation. For example, let’s think about a student who is going to take an oral exam. The student has high expectations of success and wants to surprise the panel and get the highest possible grade. To do this, he has to do it perfectly. However, the pressure on his performance is such that he ends up failing when without this overactivation he would have gotten the grade he was after.

In the field of sexual relations, fear or anxiety of performance can prevent a person from enjoying a sexual relationship. On the other hand, the secondary consequences can be varied, from a decrease in self-esteem to a breakdown in communication channels with the partner. As a consequence of all this, sexual dysfunction will appear.

What do we mean by anxiety?

Anxiety is a universal experience that is part of the human condition. It constitutes a warning alarm system in the face of a threat. It is an emotion accompanied by somatic and behavioral changes that are accompanied by a feeling of discomfort. In principle, anxiety can bring about a series of adaptive advantages:

• Increased activation allows attention to be focused on a potential danger.
• Prepares the body for this confrontation: fight or flight.
• It allows the memorization of events or stimuli that have caused fear.
• It allows the formation of conditioned fear responses.
• Allows certain cognitive patterns to change.

Everyday events can cause anxiety that is not always pathological. For example, a certain anxiety before an exam can even be beneficial. However, when its intensity or duration is excessive, we are dealing with pathological anxiety.

One form of pathological anxiety is performance anxiety. It is pathological because its intensity prevents us from correctly carrying out what we set out to do. Thus, if anxiety prevents us from having a satisfactory sexual relationship, we will speak of performance anxiety in sexual relations.

Sexual response and its dysfunctions

Although the sexual response has underlying biological requirements, it is experienced in an interpersonal, intrapersonal, and cultural context. Thus, sexual function involves a complex interaction between biological, sociocultural, and psychological factors.

In many clinical settings, the precise origin of the sexual problem is not known. However, the diagnosis of sexual dysfunction requires ruling out problems that are better explained by a nonsexual mental disorder, the effects of a substance, a medical condition, significant relationship conflict, intimate partner violence, or other stressors.

Sexual dysfunctions

Sexual dysfunctions include delayed ejaculation, erectile disorder, female orgasmic disorder, female sexual interest/arousal disorder, genital/pelvic pain/penetration disorder, male hypoactive sexual desire disorder, and premature ejaculation.

Thus, sexual dysfunctions are a group of heterogeneous disorders. They are characterized by a clinically significant alteration of the person’s ability to respond sexually or to experience sexual pleasure.

Performance anxiety in sexual dysfunctions

The clearest example of performance anxiety is probably found in erectile dysfunction. This anxiety is triggered by what Abraham and Porto called anxiety-generating factors. These factors are the following:

• Fear of failure. This involves the feeling of fear of not responding appropriately to one’s partner.
• Obligation for results. It is the need for a very consistent, long-lasting, and fast-recovering erectile response.
• Excessive altruism. This means being more concerned with the satisfaction of one’s partner and losing concentration on one’s eroticism.
• Self-observation. This involves observing the penis to see how it responds, which had previously been called the “spectator role.”

When a man experiences erectile dysfunction, the first difficulties in having satisfactory sexual relations probably appear by chance. From then on, the man begins to worry about the issue.

Worries may refer to aspects such as ” What if I can’t keep my penis erect?”, “What if my partner doesn’t like me?”, “What will happen if I can’t penetrate?” … As a result of these worries, stress hormones such as cortisol are generated.

Worry is at the root of performance anxiety

The stress hormones generated by worry are incompatible with those that trigger the sexual response. A vicious circle then occurs. The man has sex with increasing pressure to achieve an erection and to please the woman. In this sense, he is doomed to failure.

Anticipation of the next sexual encounter triggers the same anxiety, along with memories of past failures. This anticipation often overrides desire and leads to avoidance of all sexual activity, including any physical display of affection that might be the start of a sexual encounter.

The other person may feel unloved, unwanted, unattractive, and frustrated … He or she does not understand that avoiding the feared situation helps the person avoid the humiliation of another failure, and feel more in control, and less guilty about “failing”. However, this is not the solution.

Performance anxiety in sexual dysfunctions can be treated satisfactorily. Effective techniques have been proposed in clinical psychology to combat it. If this is your case, you could try to go to a specialized psychologist. He will help you solve your problem and improve your sexual and romantic relationship.

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