American biologist and zoologist Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey (1894-1956), author of the two groundbreaking reports on human sexual behavior, circa 1954. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
School period
College/University
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
255 Maine St, Brunswick, ME 04011, United States
Kinsey worked to fund his undergraduate education while attending Bowdoin College, where he graduated, magna cum laude, with a Bachelor of Science in biology and psychology in 1916.
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
Cambridge, MA, United States
In 1920, Kinsey received a doctorate degree in biology from Harvard University.
Career
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
1948
American sexuality researcher Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956), 1948. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
1965
Portrait of Dr. Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956), Director of the Institute for Sex Research, Indiana, 1965. (Photo by PhotoQuest)
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
Researcher of human sexual behavior, famous for his books Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, 1948 and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, 1953. He was also director of Indiana University's Institute for Sex Research. He is shown at his first press conference after the release of Sexual Behavior in the Human Female.
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
1952
American biologist, Alfred Charles Kinsey (1894-1956), whose pioneering investigation of human sexual behavior resulted in two controversial studies that had far-reaching influence. (Photo by Bert Garai/Keystone Features)
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
1953
Portrait of American scientist and researcher Dr. Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956), June 1953. (Photo by Arthur Siegel/The LIFE Images Collection)
Gallery of Alfred Kinsey
American sexuality researcher Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956) looks up while pointing to a passage in a book, 1940s. (Photo by Hulton Archive)
American biologist, Alfred Charles Kinsey (1894-1956), whose pioneering investigation of human sexual behavior resulted in two controversial studies that had far-reaching influence. (Photo by Bert Garai/Keystone Features)
Researcher of human sexual behavior, famous for his books Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, 1948 and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, 1953. He was also director of Indiana University's Institute for Sex Research. He is shown at his first press conference after the release of Sexual Behavior in the Human Female.
Kinsey worked to fund his undergraduate education while attending Bowdoin College, where he graduated, magna cum laude, with a Bachelor of Science in biology and psychology in 1916.
(Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey and his fellow researchers sought to...)
Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey and his fellow researchers sought to accumulate an objective body of facts regarding sex. They employed first-hand interviews to gather this data. This volume is based upon histories of approximately 5,300 males which were collected during a fifteen-year period. This text describes the methodology, sampling, coding, interviewing, statistical analyses, and then examines factors and sources of sexual outlet.
(Originally published in 1953, the material presented in S...)
Originally published in 1953, the material presented in Sexual Behavior in the Human Female was derived from personal interviews with nearly 6,000 women; from studies in sexual anatomy, physiology, psychology, and endocrinology. The study revealed the incidence and frequency with which women participate in various types of sexual activity and how such factors as age, decade of birth, and religious adherence are reflected in patterns of sexual behavior. The authors make comparisons of female and male sexual activities and investigate the factors which account for the similarities and differences between female and male patterns of behavior and provide some measure of the social significance of the various types of sexual behavior.
Alfred Charles Kinsey was an American biologist, professor of entomology and zoology, and sexologist. In 1947, he founded the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University, which is now known as the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction.
Background
Alfred Charles Kinsey was born on June 23, 1894, in Hoboken, New Jersey, United States, to the family of Sarah Ann (née Charles) and Alfred Seguine Kinsey, a professor at Stevens Institute of Technology. Alfred was the eldest of three children.
Education
In 1912, Kinsey graduated as valedictorian of his high school class.
He worked to fund his undergraduate education while attending Bowdoin College, where he graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in biology and psychology in 1916.
In 1920, Kinsey received a doctorate degree in biology from Harvard University.
Shortly after earning his doctorate at Harvard, Kinsey accepted a job as a professor in the zoology department at Indiana University in Bloomington. A specialist in botany and insects, through his research, Kinsey established himself as the No. 1 authority on the gall wasp. From 1926 to 1929, he took field trips all over the country with his students, collecting tens of thousands of gall wasp specimens along the way. He focused intently on categorizing and numbering his specimens, but longed to take his scientific investigation a step further. Turning his focus to questions of evolution and natural selection, in 1930 - a year after he was promoted to full professor - Kinsey published his findings in a paper called The Gall Wasp Genus Cynips: A Study in the Origin of the Species.
In the 1930s, Kinsey agreed to teach a marriage course. When his students starting asking him questions about sex, Kinsey realized there was very little scientific data on the matter. He decided to apply the principles of scientific research toward the topic of sexual behavior. In 1938, he launched a sex studies program. In the early 1940s, he procured funding from the National Research Council and the Rockefeller Foundation's Medical Division. In 1947, Kinsey and his research assistants became incorporated under the name the Institute for Sex Research, Inc.
In 1948, Kinsey published his first book, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male. He based the book on more than 10,000 interviews - during which men and women of all ages provided candid answers to personal questions about their sexual feelings and behaviors. The book quickly sold close to 500,000 copies. Kinsey used the royalties from the sales of his book to do more research. He came out with a sequel called Sexual Behavior in the Human Female in 1953, but it didn't sell as well as his first book.
Because Kinsey's research dealt openly with human sexuality during a time when the topic was taboo, his work was the subject of much controversy. During the course of his study, Kinsey was subjected to anti-Communist investigations, loss of funding, and a lawsuit by United States Customs over a collection of erotic photos. Nevertheless, Kinsey's Institute for Sex Research still survives today, under the new title the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction.
During the last six months of Kinsey's life, his health steadily declined as he gradually developed congestive heart failure. On August 25, 1956, Kinsey died at Bloomington Hospital in Bloomington, Indiana.
(Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey and his fellow researchers sought to...)
1948
Religion
Alfred Kinsey was an atheist.
Views
Kinsey developed the Kinsey Scale to codify sexual orientation. His scale is notable because it does not create a strict dichotomy between heterosexuality and homosexuality; the scale relies on a combination of behaviors and feelings rather than a person's self-identified sexual orientation. A 0 on the Kinsey Scale indicates complete heterosexuality, while a 6 indicates complete homosexuality. A three indicates bisexuality, while other numbers on the scale indicate a mix of heterosexual and homosexual orientations. Kinsey's colleagues later added an X to the scale to denote asexuality.
Quotations:
"We are the recorders and reporters of facts - not the judges of the behaviors we describe."
"The only kinds of sexual dysfunction are abstinence, celibacy, and delayed marriage."
"Only the human mind invents categories and tries to force facts into separated pigeonholes."
"Art alone develops weaklings, science alone, monsters. Somewhere, somehow, we must combine the two."
Personality
Kinsey identified as bisexual.
Interests
Gardening
Connections
Kinsey and his wife, Clara Brachen McMillen, were polyamorous. The couple had four children, one of whom died in childhood.