“It definitely was consensual,but…”: Normative tensions about gendered heterosexuality and young women’s mixed feelings about sex

Abstract

Sexual ambivalence—sex that is simultaneously wanted and unwanted—is not unusual in young women’s experiences with heterosex. Elucidating how gender and sexuality contribute to ambivalence is important for understanding how social forces shape oft-hidden sexual behaviors that affect women’s well-being. We draw on 20 interviews with young women in the United States to argue that mixed feelings about sex (psychological ambivalence) could stem from conflicting norms about heterosex (sociological ambivalence). Participants recalled wanting sex with partners because the characteristics met one set of social norms that valorized the encounters, but also discussed simultaneously not wanting those same experiences because of coexisting norms that stigmatized their behaviors. Such mixed feelings contributed to some women’s unease about experiences that they understood as explicitly consensual. In the end, the study highlights the importance of attending to the sociological study of ambivalence and its role in theorizing access to pleasurable, not just consensual, sex.