Attitude towards Sexuality: Perceptions of Male University Students in Gujarat

Abstract

At a time when there is an unprecedented surge in reported cases of all forms of sexual violence, including rape of women by men even within intimate relations across the world, it is essential to investigate men’s attitude towards sexuality with its intricacies from a gendered perspective, especially when the legal, social and cultural structures continue to fail in challenging the prevailing gendered discourses around sexuality. This study attempts to explore the attitude of male university students towards sexuality and encapsulate the same with gender-specific patriarchal theories. With a descriptive research design, this study interviewed 396 male university students from a chosen university in Gujarat, India, selected by stratified — systematic sampling method from different streams of study. Quantitative analysis underlined and clearly portrayed the unfavourable attitudes towards sexuality held by a large proportion of university students. This study also attempts to illustrate how gendered power inequality highly influences their sexual entitlement and sexual constriction attitudes.