ABSTRACT
Sex research has been, and in many ways still is, a taboo area. A major reason for this is that despite public inhibitions about sex research, sex itself is a subject about which almost every person considers himself or herself knowledgeable. In the United States this period of sexual behavior is associated with the figure of Anthony Comstock who, though today often painted as a ludicrous figure, was extremely powerful in his own lifetime. Since many people who have written about sex behavior have turned to historical data for source materials, the unfortunate result has often been to create new sexual mythologies based upon the old erroneous assumptions. While the model at the time was viewed as a scientific step forward, in retrospect it seems apparent it merely substituted the view that all nonprocreative sex activity was a sign of sickness for the earlier conception of sexuality as sin.
