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“Classifying D/s Profiles Without Prior Assumptions: An Application of Cluster Analysis to Social Data”

2022; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 70; Issue: 8 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00918369.2022.2036534

1540-3602

Julie C. La Corte,

Marriage and Sexual Relationships

Dominant/submissive role-play (D/s) is associated with specialized roles including Mistress, Master, Slave, Switch, Sadist, and Masochist. The current study uses cluster analysis to provide empirical evidence that no binary opposition or single spectrum constitutes a workable typology of individuals based on their affinities for these roles. The optimality of a particular choice of clustering scheme, including the number of clusters, is established using a replication technique which is presented in detail. A large number (n = 236,353) of individualized results (profiles) generated by the BDSM Test, a popular anonymous web survey, were analyzed. We hypothesize a two-dimensional typology of D/s profiles as the inferential result of our cluster analyses.