Voyeurism
Voyeurism is the sexual interest in or practice of watching other people engaged in intimate behaviors, such as undressing, sexual activity, or other actions of a private nature.
The term comes from the French voyeur which means "watcher," derived from the verb voir, “to see.” A male voyeur is commonly labelled as "Peeping Tom" or a "Jags", a term which originates from the Lady Godiva legend. However, that term is usually applied to a male who observes somebody secretly and, generally, not in a public space.
The American Psychiatric Association has classified certain voyeuristic fantasies, urges and behaviour patterns as a paraphilia in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual if the person has acted on these urges, or the sexual urges or fantasies cause marked distress or interpersonal difficulty. It is described as a disorder of sexual preference in the ICD-10. The DSM-IV defines voyeurism as the act of observing "individuals, usually strangers, engaging in sexual activity, exhibitionism, or disrobing". The diagnosis as a disorder would not be given to people who experience typical sexual arousal or amusement, simply by inadvertently seeing nudity or sexual activity.
Historical perspectives
There is relatively little academic research regarding voyeurism. When a review was published in 1976 there were only 15 available resources. Voyeurs were well-paying hole-lookers in especially Parisian brothels, a commercial innovation described as far back as 1857 but not gaining much notoriety until the 1880s, and not attracting formal medical-forensic recognition until the early 1890s. Society has accepted the use of the term voyeur as a description of anyone who views the intimate lives of others, even outside of a sexual context. This term is specifically used regarding reality television and other media which allow people to view the personal lives of others. This is a reversal from the historical perspective, moving from a term which describes a specific population in detail, to one which describes the general population vaguely.One of the few historical theories on the causes of voyeurism comes from psychoanalytic theory. Psychoanalytic theory proposes that voyeurism results from a failure to accept castration anxiety and as a result of failure to identify with the father.
Prevalence
Voyeurism has high prevalence rates in most studied populations. Voyeurism was once believed to only be present in a small portion of the population. This perception changed when Alfred Kinsey discovered that 30% of men prefer coitus with the lights on. This behaviour is not considered voyeurism by modern diagnostic standards, but there was little differentiation between normal and pathological behaviour at the time. Subsequent research showed that 65% of men had engaged in peeping, which suggests that this behaviour is widely spread throughout the population. Congruent with this, research found voyeurism to be the most common sexual law-breaking behaviour in both clinical and general populations.An earlier study, based on 60 college men from a rural area, indicates that 54% had voyeuristic fantasies, and that 42% had tried voyeurism, concluding that young men are more easily aroused by the idea.
In a national study of Sweden it was found that 7.7% of the population had engaged in voyeurism at some point. It is also believed that voyeurism occurs up to 150 times more frequently than police reports indicate. This same study also indicates that there are high levels of co-occurrence between voyeurism and exhibitionism, finding that 63% of voyeurs also report exhibitionist behaviour.
Characteristics
People engage in voyeuristic behaviours for diverse reasons, but statistics can indicate which groups are likelier to engage in the act.Early research indicated that voyeurs were more mentally healthy than other groups with paraphilias. Compared to the other groups studied, it was found that voyeurs were unlikely to be alcoholics or drug users. More recent research shows that, compared to the general population, voyeurs were moderately more likely to have psychological problems, use alcohol and drugs, and have higher sexual interest generally. This study also shows that voyeurs have a greater number of sexual partners per year, and are more likely to have had a same-sex partner than most of the populations. Both older and newer research found that voyeurs typically have a later age of first sexual intercourse. However, other research found no difference in sexual history between voyeurs and non-voyeurs. Voyeurs who are not also exhibitionists tend to be from a higher socioeconomic status than those who do show exhibitionist behaviour.
Gender differences
Research shows that, like almost all paraphilias, voyeurism is more common in men than in women. However, research has found that men and women both report roughly the same likelihood that they would hypothetically engage in voyeurism. There appears to be a greater gender difference when actually presented with the opportunity to perform voyeurism. There is very little research done on voyeurism in women, so very little is known on the subject which limits the degree to which it can generalize to normal female populations.A 2021 study found that 36.4% of men and 63.8% of women were strongly repulsed by the idea of voyeurism. Men were more likely to be mildly or moderately aroused than women, but there was little gender difference among those who reported strong arousal. Men reported slightly higher willingness to commit voyeurism but, when risk is introduced, willingness diminishes in both sexes proportionally to the risk involved. Individual differences in sociosexuality and sexual compulsivity were found to contribute to the sex differences in voyeurism.
Contemporary perspectives
theory suggests that voyeurism exists because looking at naked others shifts from an ancillary sexual behaviour to a primary sexual act. This results in a displacement of sexual desire making the act of watching someone the primary means of sexual satisfaction.Voyeurism has also been linked with obsessive–compulsive disorder. When treated by the same approach as OCD, voyeuristic behaviours significantly decrease.
Treatment
Professional treatment
Historically voyeurism has been treated in a variety of ways. Psychoanalytic, group psychotherapy and shock aversion approaches have all been attempted with limited success. There is some evidence which shows that pornography can be used as a form of treatment for voyeurism. This is based on the idea that countries with pornography censorship have high amounts of voyeurism. Additionally shifting voyeurs from voyeuristic behaviour, to looking at graphic pornography, to looking at the nudes in Playboy has been successfully used as a treatment. These studies show that pornography can be used as a means of satisfying voyeuristic desires without breaking the law.Voyeurism has also been successfully treated with a mix of anti-psychotics and antidepressants. However the patient in this case study had a multitude of other mental health problems. Intense pharmaceutical treatment may not be required for most voyeurs.
There has also been success in treating voyeurism through using treatment methods for obsessive compulsive disorder. There have been multiple instances of successful treatment of voyeurism through putting patients on fluoxetine and treating their voyeuristic behaviour as a compulsion.
Criminology
Non-consensual voyeurism is considered to be a form of sexual abuse. When the interest in a particular subject is obsessive, the behaviour may be described as stalking.The United States FBI assert that some individuals who engage in "nuisance" offences may also have a propensity for violence based on behaviours of serious sex offenders. An FBI researcher has suggested that voyeurs are likely to demonstrate some characteristics that are common, but not universal, among serious sexual offenders who invest considerable time and effort in the capturing of a victim ; careful, methodical planning devoted to the selection and preparation of equipment; and often meticulous attention to detail.
Little to no research has been done into the demographics of voyeurs.
Legal status
Voyeurism is not a crime in common law. In common law countries, it is only a crime if made so by legislation.Canada
In Canada, for example, voyeurism was not a crime when the case Frey v. Fedoruk et al. arose in 1947. In that case, in 1950, the Supreme Court of Canada held that courts could not criminalise voyeurism by classifying it as a breach of the peace and that Parliament would have to specifically outlaw it.A test of the lack of laws related to voyeurism came in February 2005. It became public knowledge that a website called peepingthong.com had become a depository of photos showing young women, many of them University of Victoria students, sitting down at various campus locations, such as libraries. While the act of photographing them in isolation may not have caused a commotion, each of the women revealed their thong underwear to create a whale tail.
Reaction from female members of the university community was not positive. The chairwoman of the student union, Joanna Groves, believed that perpetrator committed an action that were "a violation of someone's privacy." The outreach coordinator for the University of Victoria Student Society Women's Centre, Caitlin Warbeck, went as far as to call it "sexual assault." The photographed individuals also appeared to be completely unaware that they were being watched.
While the photos did cause a commotion, law enforcement could not do anything because the photos were snapped in public locations. University administrators were also powerless because the site was not affiliated with the institution. Campus security, however, did put up flyers in certain parts of campus where the perpetrator were believed to be operating.
On November 1, 2005, Parliament outlawed voyeurism when section 162 was added to the Canadian Criminal Code, declaring voyeurism to be a sexual offence when it violates a reasonable expectation of privacy. In the case of R v Jarvis, the Supreme Court of Canada held that for the purposes of that law, the expectation of privacy is not all-or-nothing; rather there are degrees of privacy, and although secondary-school pupils in the school building cannot reasonably expect as much privacy as in the bedroom, nonetheless they can expect enough privacy so that photographing them without their consent for the purpose of sexual gratification is forbidden.