Sexual self-concept and intimacy in context of vaginismus: A case–control study

Abstract

Background

As sexuality and its related issues are significantly associated with sociocultural settings, addressing the sexual health status of individuals in different societies is of the utmost importance. Women with vaginismus have more stress, anxiety, depression, and they also feel hopeless and have low self-esteem. And this problem can disturb intimacy between couples and women's sexual self-concept. Therefore, the present study was to determine and compare sexual self-concept and intimacy in women presenting with and without vaginismus.

Methods

This case–control study was conducted in 2021–2022 on 240 women with and without vaginismus, referring to selected sexual health clinics based in Iran. The data collection tools recruited were the demographic characteristics’ information, the Multidimensional Sexual Self-Concept Questionnaire, and the Sexual Intimacy Scale. To calculate the odds ratio of the studied variables, the logistic regression analysis using the SPSS Statistics software (ver. 25) was also employed.

Results

The mean age of women with and without vaginismus was 27.85 ± 4.62 and 28.51 ± 4.34, respectively. According to the regression results, the variables of sexual intimacy (odds ratio (OR) = 0.864, P < 0.001), sexual awareness (OR = 6.090, P = 0.003), sexual-anxiety (OR = 1.613, P < 0.001), fear of sex (OR = 1.338, P = 0.021) and sexual problem prevention (OR = 0.765, P = 0.016) were significantly associated with vaginismus.

Conclusions

According to these results, sexual intimacy, sexual awareness, sexual-anxiety, fear of sex and sexual problem prevention were significantly associated with vaginismus. Therefore, it is suggested that for the treatment of women with vaginismus, interventions can be designed to improve sexual intimacy, sexual knowledge and positive sexual self-concept and reduce sexual anxiety.