Not all girls are as willing to make their physical development a matter of group celebration, however, as the following case demonstrates. The girls in our school were ridiculed to a certain degree by the others if they had a bust or wore a brassiere. I very much did not want to be singled out and made fun of, so I tried very hard to hide my changing figure. When my mother bought me a brassiere while I was in the sixth grade, I refused to wear it. Instead I wore two undershirts and a tight slip to hide my bust.
Kinsey reports from his female sample that, all told, some twenty-
seven percent recalled that they had been aroused erotically at some
time during the age of puberty.
However, Kinsey is of the opinion that
the number of preadolescent girls who are ever aroused sexually must be
much higher than the record indicates. Out of the 659 females in the
sample who had experienced orgasm before they were adolescent, eighty-
six percent had had their first experience through masturbating, some
seven percent had discovered it in sexual contact with other girls, two
percent in petting, and one percent in coitus with boys or older males.
Two percent had had their first orgasm in physical contact with dogs or
cats, and some two percent had first reached orgasm through other circumstances,
including climbing a rope. (Kinsey, 1953, p. 106).
At the age of twelve I (a girl) discovered masturbation
while washing myself in the bath; I'm
sure that my discovery was in great part derived
from the intimacy with my girl friend (breast
fondling between the ages of eleven and thirteen).
Masturbation led to orgasm.
In the following case a preadolescent girl attributes part of her
sexual "awakening" to sex dream experience.
Wild and confused dreams made me feel funny-just
as if I had to urinate. The dreams included
boys and girls kissing, and the funny feeling I
got was both distressing and exciting. I had no
idea as to what the dreams meant, but I definitely
realized that they pertained to sex.
The incidence of preadolescent sex play at particular ages, that
is, the active incidence, appears to be highest for girls in the
younger years of preadolescence rather than in the older years of preadolescence.
Some eight percent of the females in the Kinsey sample recalled
heterosexual sex play at ages five and seven, but fewer recalled
it at later years of preadolescence.
Only three percent recalled that
they were having sex play just before pubescence. For most, preadolescent
play had been restricted to a single experience or to a few stray
experiences. Exceedingly few of the girls seemed to have developed any
pattern of frequent or regular sex activity.
One girl for every seven
boys was having heterosexual play near the approach of adolescence; the
girls who do accept contacts at that age apparently have more than one
male partner. (Kinsey, 1953, p. 110-111).
At each age, pre-pubertal boys report more sexual activity of every
kind than do girls. (Broderick, April 1966). The marked differences
in incidence for boys and girls just prior to puberty may in part
depend on the increased restraints that are placed on girls by their
parents as they approach puberty-restraints which girls often resent
after a carefree childhood. (Martinson, 1966).
The preadolescent boy's capacity for specific sexual responses develops
rapidly as he nears preadolescence. It is not matched by a similar
capacity in the female. The male subculture also actively advocates
sexual activity for the male.
This no doubt affects the incidence of
sexual experiences among preadolescent boys. The importance of biological
over social factors in the incidence differential between preadolescent
boys and girls is difficult to measure. Broderick and Udry
(1966) among the sociologists of sex emphasize social factors; Kinsey
placed more emphasis on physical capacity.