Sexuality in mental health: Brazilian science production review (2001–2014)

Abstract

Aiming at analyzing mental health and sexuality studies, specifically in papers published in Brazil, this dissertation brings a review of the literature carried out in two databases. It can be noticed that studies on sex, gender and sexuality show the complexity of the understanding of human sexual life going from essentialist to constructivist perspectives, conceiving sexuality in several manners. However, studies on madness, mental health and psychosocial care point to different conceptions of mental sickening process, mental health being at the same time a science field and a psychological well-being value to be achieved. Surveys in nursery homes show that institution agents represent the sexuality of a mentally suffering person (MSP) as abnormal or non-existing. The review of academic production on the subject, has put together 685 publications, 43 of them in both, with only 109 from Brazil, these ones having been systematized by title and abstract, only eleven were selected and studied thoroughly. Results show that the analyzed science production is scarce, being the theme just at its beginning in collective health, with the predominance of biomedical approaches focusing in on sexual behavior, with special attention to the vulnerability to IST/HIV/AIDS, the absence of sexual education and gaps in the training to work with sexuality. The conclusion is that the studied Brazilian science production on sexuality in the field of mental health is not centered on sexual and reproductive rights of MSP, while user sexual practices and the representations of professionals come to the fore in the analyses.

Disclosure of interest

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.