The dot probe paradigm for measuring sexual interest

The measurement of sexual interest is of particular importance for the diagnosis and therapy of deviant sexual behavior in forensic psychiatry. However, an instrument for measuring sexual interest accurately with acceptable psychometric quality criteria does not exist to this date (Thornton and Laws 2009). It has been proven that evolutionarily important, emotional stimuli are selected and processed preattentively and attract attention automatically (Öhmann et al. 2001). Spiering and Everaerd postulate that a sexually relevant stimulus is selected and processed preattentively in a similar manner as an emotional stimulus, thereby automatically triggering the focusing of attention and causing a bias of the viewer’s attention (Spiering and Everaerd 2007). We conclude that if measuring attention is possible, it would also be possible to measure sexual interest indirectly and objectively. We used the dot probe task and the measurement of eye movements in order to explore the processes and bias of attention. A total of 46 heterosexual men and women participated in five different study designs. All experiments were conducted consecutively and different parameters of the study design were changed systematically. All results are discussed in detail and a proposal for a perfect specific Dot Probe Paradigm for measuring sexual interest reliably and objectively is presented.2013-10-2