Situational sexual behavior

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Situational sexual behavior is sexual behavior of a kind that is different from what is usual for that person (or from what that person normally exhibits) due to a social environment that permits, encourages, or compels those acts.

Sexual orientation Part of sexology
Common classifications
Asexuality Bisexuality Heterosexuality Homosexuality Pansexuality
Other classifications
Autosexuality Kinsey scale Klein Sexual Orientation Grid Monosexuality Paraphilia Zoosexuality
Related articles
Biology and sexual orientation Demographics of sexual orientation Non-human animal sexuality Interracial marriage/sexuality Situational sexual behavior
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For example, people might not have sex with prostitutes in their home countries, but may do so when they visit other countries, where such activities are legal or ignored by authorities. To contrast, for those whose primary sexual identification is pedophilia, visiting foreign countries where sex with minors can be easily practiced is not situational sexual behavior.

Other examples are people in prison, the military, single sex boarding schools, or other sex-segregated communities, where members of those communities might engage in homosexual behaviors but identify as heterosexual otherwise. "Jailhouse gay" is a common slang term for such a situation.

In Islamic societieswhere the genders are heavily segregated, same-sex encounters are performed as an alternative to heterosexual encounters. This is despite Islamic prohibitions on homosexuality, and the fact that in many of these societies sodomy is punishable by death. The Wall Street Journal reported on this occurrence within Saudi Arabia on April 4, 2007, naming Jeddah and Riyadh as capitals of gay life in the kingdom, and noting that most Saudi men who engage in same-sex encounters "don't consider themselves gay, and others dismiss past homosexual behavior in their lives as part of growing up."

Many people change their sexual behaviour depending on the situation. For example, men and women in a university may practice bisexuality, but only in that environment. Experimentation of this sort is more common among adolescents, both male and female. Common terms for this trend include "heteroflexible", "BUG" (Bisexual Until Graduation), or "LUG" (Lesbian Until Graduation).