foot fetishism
Foot fetishism, foot partialism, or podophilia is a pronounced sexual interest in feet. It is the most common form of sexual preference for otherwise non-sexual objects or body parts.[1]
Scope
In clinical terms, a fetish is a stimulus that is a requirement for sexual arousal to occur (also called an "exclusive paraphilia"). Therefore, a person who can derive sexual arousal from the human foot along with other more conventional stimuli (i.e. kissing, petting, etc) would not necessarily meet the clinical definition of having a fetish. This article focuses on arousal by feet in general (i.e., the popular use definition of fetish), and not on the clinical definition of foot fetishism.
Foot fetish has been defined as a pronounced sexual interest in the lower limb or anything that covers portions of them. Freud considered foot binding as a form of fetishism.[2]
For a foot fetishist, points of attraction include the shape and size of the foot and toes (including the actual toe nails. eg: french pedicure), the texture of the skin, cleanliness, state of dress (i.e., barefoot or clad in socks or nylons) and odor. Foot lovers may enjoy touching, tickling, kissing, licking, sucking, smelling, and/or lovemaking with the objects of their affections.[2]
Like other paraphilias, foot fetishism encompasses a wide range of predilections; one foot fetishist may be aroused by scenarios that another fetishist finds non-sexual or even repulsive.
Aretifism, a sexual attraction to people who are without footwear, rather than a fetish (or partialism) for feet.
Prevalence
As fetishist behavior is unlikely to be reported, its true prevalence is unknown.[2]
In order to determine the relative prevalences of different fetishes, scientists obtained a sample of at least 5000 individuals worldwide from 381 Internet discussion groups. The relative prevalences were estimated based on (a) the number of groups devoted to a particular fetish, (b) the number of individuals participating in the groups and (c) the number of messages exchanged. Using these measures, feet and shoes were found to be the most common target of preferences. 47% of the sampled population had a preference for feet and toes.[3][4]
In August 2006, America Online accidentally released a database of search terms used by their subscribers. In ranking only those searches that included the word "fetish", it was found that the top search was for feet.[5]
Proposed explanations
Neurologist Vilayanur S. Ramachandran proposed that foot fetishism is caused by the feet and the genitals occupying adjacent areas of the somatosensory cortex, possibly entailing some neural crosstalk between the two.[6]
Researchers have hypothesized that foot fetishism increases during epidemics of sexually transmitted diseases. In one study, the frequency of foot-fetish depictions in the mass-circulation pornographic literature was measured over a 30-yr. interval. An exponential increase was noted during the period of the current AIDS epidemic. [7] Increased interest in feet as sexual objects has also been observed during the syphilis epidemics of the 16th and 19th centuries in Europe.[8]
See also
References
- ^ Dobson, R. "Heels are the world's No 1 fetish." The Independent; February 25, 2007 (retrieved via The Wayback Machine on 17 July 2007).
- ^ a b c Cameron Kippen (November 2004). The History of Footwear - Foot Sex. Retrieved on 2007-06-08.
- ^ Scorolli C, Ghirlanda S, Enquist M, Zattoni S, Jannini E A (2007). Relative prevalence of different fetishes. International Journal of Impotence Researchadvance online publication 15 February 2007; doi: 10.1038/sj.ijir.3901547. http://www.nature.com/ijir/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/3901547a.html retrieved March 2007.
- ^ Dobson, Roger (2007). Heels are the world's No 1 fetish. The Independent Online Edition, http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/article2303022.ece, accessed February 2007.
- ^ AOL's Accidental Release of Search Data - The Sexmind of America. http://aphrodisiology.com/aol-sex-data, accessed June 2007.
- ^ Kringelbach, Morten. Bodily Illusions. http://www.kringelbach.dk/Preprint_Beagle_BodilyIllusions.html, last accessed Sept 2006.
- ^ Giannini AJ, Colapietro G, Slaby AE, Melemis SM, Bowman, RK (1998). Sexualization of the female foot as a response to sexually transmitted epidemics: a preliminary study. Psychological Reports, Vol. 83, No. 2, 1998, pp. 491-498
- ^ Kippen, Cameron. The History of Footwear - The Sexy Foot. http://podiatry.curtin.edu.au/sexy.html#vd, last accessed September 2006.
External links
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