We now turn to a systematic account of the young child's sexual and erotic encounters, first of all with peers, and later with preadolescents, adolescents, and adults. Many children "experiment" with one another sexually. Approximately half of the mothers in the Sears study (1957) reported some activity which could be identified as sex play. Some play was between brothers and sisters, some with neighbor children, some was with children of the same sex and some with the opposite sex.
This exploration is often carried to what could be dangerous
extremes, such as the insertion of unclean or rusty objects into body
orifices. "Doctor games" are popular. They serve to give the child an
excuse for examining the sex organs of his playmates. (Hurlock, 1950, p. 493).
Before entering first grade there were those
afternoons at my friend's house. Her mother
worked so my friend was always free to do as she
pleased during the day. We used to play "doctor"
in her bedroom which involved inserting a
pencil into the vagina and examining each other.
It would be quite wrong to assume that all of the activity in
"playing doctor" such as taking temperatures rectally is erotic play.
It would also be quite in error to assume that all children who play
doctor are erotically awakened children. On the other hand, that the
"playing doctor" encounter can have erotic overtones that go beyond the
mere desire to play with other children and the desire to satisfy their
curiosity about the nature of the genitals of others is quite clear.
The following two cases illustrate this point.
It was at the age of five that I (a girl) first
viewed the genitalia of the opposite sex. We
lived in a duplex and the family next door had
three children, all of which were girls about my
own age. They had a male cousin who came to visit
and we all ended up in the basement behind the
furnace playing doctor. No matter what he would
say his symptoms were, we were so fascinated with
his penis, as none of us had seen one before,
that it was always the center of our examinations.
I remember giggling as I punched it and as
I dunked it in some red food colored water that
we were using for medicine. This seemed to give
him great enjoyment. One girl put hand lotion and
a bandage on his penis and in the process he had
an erection. We asked him to do it again but
there was no such luck. He suddenly felt embarrassed
and offended and said he didn't want to
play any more. One of the other girls and I felt
that his erection was quite a trick, but I was
glad that he had that "long thing" and not us.
However, the third girl talked about it for days
and began asking other boys in the neighborhood
to come over and play doctor, probably in anticipation
of seeing another erection trick. It was
unique and fun to bounce around and to swing it
in the doctor exams that one day, but I never had
any further interest after that.
My neighborhood environment has always been
quite permissive which enabled me (a boy) the
time and freedom to become the finest five year
old doctor in my neighborhood. I clearly remember
associating my penile erections with examination
of the next door girl's anatomy.
Very commonly sex play among children takes the form of "show it"
games.