Sexual Orientation

1. American Psychological Association: "An enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions to men, women or both sexes."

2. Berkley University LGBT Resources: "The deep-seated direction of one's sexual (erotic) attraction. It is on a continuum and not a set of absolute categories...sexual orientation evolves through a multistage developmental process, and may change over time."

3. NSCU: "The affectional or loving attraction to another person. It can be considered as raning along a continuum from same sex attraction only at one end of the continuum to opposite sex attraction only at the other end."

It should be noted that many sources discussed a widespread confusion about what constitute sexusal orientation. Is it a behavior? A psychology? A combination? Is it developed? Inate? A combination? Is attraction enough to comprise orientation? Are actual sexual acts necessary? Is experiencing the feeling of love requisite? Many were unwilling to offer a definition and leave it at that. Multiple sources struggled also with the terminology used to describe sexual orientation. Homosexual and heterosexual were often deemed insufficient.

I feel most comfortable with the idea of the sliding scale:

{Same Sex Only}------------------------{Both Sexes}-----------------------{Opposite Sex Only}

This system provides for the idea that one might fall somewhere in between the defined options.

The part of this definition that I find most troubling is what actually constitutes an individuals position on the scale. Does the scale measure merely feelings of attraction or are deeper romantic tendancies here constituted? The two ideas are difficult enough to disentangle in the first place.