JOURNAL OF PSYCHOPATHOLOGY 2022;28:113-119 Psychopathology of Sexual Behavior

DOI: 10.36148/2284-0249-468

Involuntary Celibate (Incel):

validation of the Incel Trait Scale (ITS)
in the Italian male population

Lilybeth Fontanesi1, Giulia Cosi1, Adolfo Di Crosta1,

Maria Cristina Verrocchio1, Emmanuele A. Jannini2, Giacomo Ciocca3
1
Department of Psychological, Health and Territorial Sciences, “G. d’Annunzio” University of Chi-
eti-Pescara, Chieti, Italy; 2 Chair of Endocrinology & Medical Sexology (ENDOSEX), Department
of Systems Medicine, University of Rome Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy; 3 Department of Dynamic and
Clinical Psychology, and Health Studies, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy

SUMMARY
Introduction
The term Incel represents the union of the words “INvoluntary” and “CELibates” (involuntary
celibate) and it refers to a male phenomenon of discrimination and hate towards female
population. In some cases, Incel characterized also by aggressive behaviors and violence
acts, due to social and psychological factors. For this reason, it is necessary an accurate
evaluation of Incel phenomenon to prevent it.
Objectives
Therefore, the aims are to validate the Incel Trait Scale (ITS) in the Italian Language, analyze
the structure of the scale and adapt it to the Italian population.
Methods
A total of 1316 Italian cisgender (gender identity matched assigned sex at birth) men par-
ticipated in the study, they fill out the survey on the online platform QUALTRICS. We admin-
istered them a set of questionnaires, with the sociodemographic part and the Italian version
of ITS.
Received: July 28, 2022
Results
Accepted: September 26, 2022
Explorative and Confirmatory Factor Analysis revealed good fit indexes (CFA: χ²/df = 6.375,
Correspondence
SRMR = .065, CFI = .885, RMSEA = .070). Also, reliability was good with the Cronbach α
Giacomo Ciocca coefficient of .887 for Failure factor, .810 for Outcasted factor, and .712 for Enraged factor.
Department of Dynamic and Clinical Conclusions
Psychology, and Health Studies, Sapienza
Incel Trait Scale (ITS) represents the first psychometric tool to evaluate the Incel phenom-
University of Rome, via degli Apuli 1, 00185
Rome, Italy. enon among Italian male population and it is fundamental to prevent and individuate risk
E-mail: [email protected] factors for the gender violence in terms of discrimination and aggression. Moreover, ITS also
permits to better studied the psychopathological factors associated to Involuntary Celibate.

How to cite this article: Fontanesi L, Cosi Key words: Involuntary Celibate, Incel, psychometry, assessment, psychopathology
G, Di Crosta A, et al. Involuntary Celibate
(Incel): validation of the Incel Trait Scale (ITS)
in the Italian male population. Journal of Psy-
chopathology 2022;28:113-119. https://doi.
org/10.36148/2284-0249-468 Introduction
The term Incel represents the union of the words “INvoluntary” and “CELi-
© Copyright by Pacini Editore Srl bates” (involuntary celibate), these are mainly heterosexual men who con-
sider themselves unable to establish sexual and romantic relationships
OPEN ACCESS with a woman 1.
This is an open access article distributed in accordance This term was coined by Alana – a bisexual Canadian student – in 1997.
with the CC-BY-NC-ND (Creative Commons Attribu- Alana created an online forum called Alana’s Involuntary Celibacy Project
tion-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International)
license. The article can be used by giving appropriate with the aim of build an inclusive community and form a virtual support
credit and mentioning the license, but only for non- group to help those who were struggling with intimate relationships 2. Over
commercial purposes and only in the original version.
For further information: https://creativecommons.org/
time these forums have changed, they became a place where the partici-
licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed.en pants had the opportunity to manifest their aggressiveness against wom-

113
L. Fontanesi et al.

an. Following the same patterns, the concept of being incel traits of personality. Following the Identity theory
Incel has also changed, so in 2003 Alana decided to model, a two-step process in which researchers define
close her blog 2. Today the term is used to refer mainly words and meanings associated with a particular iden-
to misogynistic men who are seeking heterosexual sex. tity, and then this set of bipolar measures is delivered
The Incel subculture was born within online communi- to respondents and factor analysis is used to assess
ties, particularly in the so-called Manosphere. The Ma- validity. The measure is then used to predict behaviors,
nosphere is a term used to refer to blogs, websites and emotions, or distress. Authors determined words and
forums in which participants believe in the centralization meanings associated with Incel personality, by coding
of the male figure and show a total and declared aver- traits and characteristics that journalists associated with
sion to feminism 3. these individuals and this community about their rela-
The ideology behind the Incel culture is strongly radi- tionships with women, gathered via Google News 4. The
calized against feminism. According to Incel’ view femi- validation process was made on a sample of 541 Amer-
nism undermines and weakens all men’s social role 3,4. ican men, from the general population, aged from 18
However, Incel ideologies present a clear purely mi- to 30 years old 4. The participant had to specify which
sogynist vision 5, capable of fueling the false belief that word in the pair best represents himself, and rate it from
women are the only ones to blame for Incel’s loneliness 0 to 9. The “Incel trait scale” composed of twenty items
and sexual frustration. In this subculture, it is believed has a satisfactory internal consistency (α = .92). Start-
that, from a biological point of view, man and woman ing from a pool of 29 items, factor analysis revealed two
are different and consequently have other sexual selec- basic factors, the first factor, called defeat contains 13
tion criteria 1. According to this idea, women reject them items (α = .91) and the second, called hateful, has 7
because they are unattractive. In this sense, Incels do items (α = .81) 4. At the present, this represents the only
not consider themselves unattractive only from a physi- measure of Incel personality characteristics published.
cal point of view, also status and wealth are, according
to them, relevant aspects in the possibility of having a
partner or not 6. Aims
Most of the study on the Incel population focus on the There are some evidences of the spread of the Incel
misogynistic and political side of the phenomenon 7-9, subculture in Italy, especially online, but to our knowl-
while fewer studies focused on their personality and edge an Italian measure of Incel characteristics is not
mental health 10. The phenomenon of Incels has be- available. Based on the above considerations, the aims
come worrisome as stated by a EU official document of the present study are to validate the ITS in the Italian
investigating the Incel phenomenon, most of those who Language, analyze the structure of the scale and adapt
identified as Incel, are also extremists, and take part in it to the Italian population.
Nazism and racists movements such as “altright” and
“whitecel” 11. Although this phenomenon has existed for Methods
several years, it has only recently aroused great interest
in sociologists and psychologists, due to the worrying Participants and procedures
number of episodes of violence claimed by white In- A total of 1316 Italian cisgender (gender identity
cels. The explicit attitudes of hostility towards women matched assigned sex at birth) men participated in
seem to generate a possible scenario of aggravated vi- the study, they fill out the survey on the online plat-
olence against women, as previously demonstrated by form QUALTRICS. Participants were recruited through
the attack of a self-proclaimed Incel which took place in a snowball sampling in the main social media, in the
2018 in Toronto 12. In fact, from 2014 until now, attacks general population. Inclusion criteria were being at least
by Incel have occurred mainly in America and Cana- 18 years old, being cisgender male, understand Italian
da 3,13. The first attack by a man claiming to be Incel, language. The data collection took place between Sep-
Elliot Roger, happened in California in 2014. He killed 6 tember 2021 and January 2022. The research protocol
people, injuring 14 others, before committing suicide 13. was approved by the Institutional Review Board of Psy-
Then others followed, not only in the United States, but chology of the Department of Psychological, Health and
also in Canada and around Europe 7,14. Territorial Sciences of the University “G. d’Annunzio” of
In the light of these considerations, it is crucial to un- Chieti-Pescara (nr. 21004). Participants were informed
derstand and evaluate Incel’s characteristics, in order about the research’s aims and privacy settings and did
to prevent violent conduct but also to create adequate not receive any financial compensation for their partici-
programs of interventions 15. pation in the study. Each participant, therefore, gave
In this regard, Scaptura and Boyle (2019) developed the own consent for the study responding to a specific
a self-report questionnaire that can measure possible item on the online platform. The entire protocol was

114
 Italian validation of Incel Trait Scale

language, preserving the correct emotional nuance in

TABLE I. Descriptive characteristics of the sample.
our language.
Variables Frequency (%)
Nationality Analysis plan
Italian 881(98.8) The first step consisted in the language adaptation, us-
Foreign 11(1.2) ing the forward and backward translation technique. In
Relational status
the second step we conducted a confirmatory analysis
Married 107(12.0) following Scapatura and Boyle (2019) subscale division.
Single 447(50.0) Unfortunately, the structure of the original version didn’t
In a relationship 338(38.0) fit with our data. considering these results, we conduct-
Scolarity ed an exploratory factor analysis and subsequentially a
Middle school 25(2.8) confirmatory factor analysis.
High school diploma 368(42.0)
Bachelor degree 237(26.5)
Statistical analysis
Master degree 185(20.2) The Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) ver-
Post-lauream 77(8.5) sion 26 for Windows and AMOS were used to run the
explorative factor analysis and the confirmatory factor
analysis (CFA) and the correlation between the vari-
ables. Internal consistency was estimated by the Cron-
anonymous. After removing incomplete protocols and bach α coefficient, for both the subscales and total
participants who did not meet the inclusion criteria, the score: α > .90 are considered excellent indicators, α
final sample for the present study was composed by comprised between .80 and .90 are very good indica-
892 participants, aged between 18 and 50 years old tors, α included between .70 and .80 are evaluated as
(M = 29.40, Sd = 8.03), demographic and personal appropriate, coefficient included between .70 and .80
characteristics are reported in Table I. are estimated as sufficient, and α < .60 are insufficient
indicators. We conducted an exploratory factor analy-
Assessment sis to better evaluate the structure of our Italian version
Participants were administrated with a set of question- of the “Incel Trait Scale”. Specifically, the component
naires, divided into two parts. The first part consisted in structure and reliability of the questionnaire was ex-
a sociodemographic questionnaire including informa- plored using principal component analysis (PCA). A
tion about age, education and relationship status. The varimax rotation was used. We used the scree plot, the
second part was composed by the Italian translation of eigenvalues, and the parallel analysis (with 1000 repli-
the ITS, cations) to guide the retention of the components.
CFA was carried out using the Maximum Likelihood
Incel Trait Scale (ITS)
as appropriate estimator. Model fit was evaluated by
The “Incel trait scale” consists of 20 pairs of opposite
means of the following fit indexes: the χ²/df statistic; the
adjectives, such as “strong” and “weak”, “fulfilled-frus-
Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) as-
trated”, “accepted – rejected”, “successful-defeated”
sessing the fitting of the model to the general population
and violent-nonviolent”. respondents have to slide the
(the RMSEA value indicates a good adaptation the more
scale to “indicate which word describes you better”.
its rate approaches “0”, Browne and Cudek (1993) sug-
Each pair was scaled from 0 to 9. The pair was ran-
gest that values ranging from .05 and .08 are indica-
domly presented to participants, and then recoded as
tive of an satisfactory fit) 16; the Comparative Fit Index
follow: 0 corresponds to the “good” and “positive” ad-
(CFI) show scores between 0 and 1 (a value over .95
jective in the pair, while 9 correspond to the negative
is considered excellent, a value between .90 and .95
antonym and related to the Incel personality.
considerate a very good index, values between .85 and
ITS translation and adaptation .90 are considered good) and the Standardized Root
We put the original version of the ITS through a forward Mean Square Residual (SRMR) specifies the difference
and backward translation technique, having developed between the residuals of the sample covariance matrix
a consensus of the authors who developed the scale. and the theorized model, an acceptable value is con-
The translation and adaptation were carried out from sidered less than .08 17.
English to Italian by two expert bilingual translators. A
group of clinical psychologists evaluated each word,
Results
according to an accurate interpretation of the Italian
population. The main challenge was to discriminate the Explorative and confirmatory factor analysis
meaning of some terms that are synonyms in the Italian The results from these analyses revealed a three factors

115
L. Fontanesi et al.

structure with satisfactory reliability values, unlikely the erature 16,17 the goodness of these fit indexes is accept-
original version that identified only two factors (defeated able. In Table III are reported the mean and standard
and hateful). We named the first factor as “Failure” since deviations for each item, and the factor loadings for
it reflects those “Incel” traits and attitudes associated 19 item and 3 factors, which range from good to ad-
to failure, insecurity, and frustration. The second factor, equate (Fig. 1).
“Outcasted”, is related to aspects concerning rejection
and ostracization. Finally, the third factor, “Enraged”, is Reliability
The analysis of internal consistency showed an overall
associated to traits and attitudes such as violence, rage,
Cronbach’s α coefficient of .886. In the three subscales,
and resentment. The factor structure of the question-
the Cronbach α coefficient was .887 for Failure factor,
naire was evaluated using PCA. A varimax rotation was
.810 for Outcasted factor, and .712 for Enraged factor.
used. The pattern matrix and the items corresponding
to the Incel personality is reported in Table II. Nine items Correlation among ITS scales
showed satisfactory loadings (i.e., > 0.40) on the first We found positive correlation between the three ITS
factor, five items showed satisfactory loadings on the factors. Each factor positively correlates with another
second factor and further five items showed satisfactory subsacale as well as the total ITS score: failure cor-
loadings on the third factor. One item (i.e, “disgusted”) relates with outcasted (r = .666, p > .001) and en-
showed cross-loadings (i.e., a difference < 0.20 be- raged (r =. 160, p > .001) and the total score (r = .892,
tween the loadings on two or more components), and p > .001); outcasted factor positively correlates with en-
therefore was excluded from the final measure.
We testes the PCA model by means of a CFA reported
in Figure 1 where the three-factor model, composed
by 19 items and scale are correlated with each other.
The model fit indices were: χ²/df = 6.375, SRMR = .065,
CFI = .885, RMSEA = .070. According to the field lit-

TABLE II. Pattern matrix of the PCA for the “Incel Traits Scale”.
Factor loading
Scale Item
A B C
A. Failure ITEM 1 Insecure .831
ITEM 2 Confused .784
ITEM 6 Not confident .775
ITEM 7 Frustrated .706
ITEM 9 Sad .650
ITEM 10 Paranoid .627
ITEM 13 Defeated .614
ITEM 15 Weak .602
ITEM 20 Fearful .511
B. Outcasted ITEM 5 Shunned .760
ITEM 11 Rejected .685
ITEM 14 Unattractive .573
ITEM 16 Scorned .554
ITEM 17 Excluded .539
C. Enraged ITEM 4 Vengeful .808
ITEM 8 Enraged .679
ITEM 12 Resentful .673
ITEM 18 Violent .513 FIGURE 1. Confirmatory factor analysis representation. Con-
firmatory factor analysis of the Incel Trait Scale. Model shows
ITEM 19 Hateful .489 standardized parameters estimates.

116
 Italian validation of Incel Trait Scale

TABLE III. M, SD and factor loadings (CFA) of the single items of the italian version of the “Incel Traits Scale”.
Scale Item M SD Factor loading
A. Failure ITEM 1 Insecure 3.97 2.33 .75
ITEM 2 Confused 3.56 2.17 .75
ITEM 6 Not confident 4.07 2.40 .56
ITEM 7 Frustrated 4.09 2.18 .64
ITEM 9 Sad 3.60 2.20 .83
ITEM 10 Paranoid 3.74 2.30 .57
ITEM 13 Defeated 3.90 1.87 .67
ITEM 15 Weak 3.67 1.94 .72
ITEM 20 Fearful 4.03 1.91 .64
B. Outcasted ITEM 5 Shunned 2.83 1.84 .69
ITEM 11 Rejected 3.12 2.15 .75
ITEM 14 Unattractive 3.91 2.02 .71
ITEM 16 Scorned 3.34 1.64 .71
ITEM 17 Excluded 3.49 2.23 .57
C. Enraged ITEM 4 Vengeful 3.51 2.27 .52
ITEM 8 Enraged 3.07 2.18 .56
ITEM 12 Resentful 3.02 2.24 .60
ITEM 18 Violent 1.91 2.14 .66
ITEM 19 Hateful 2.90 1.90 .52

raged and the total score as well (respectively r = .295, one (Tab. III) due to the “violent- nonviolent” item, and
p > .001, r = .841, p > .001). Finally enraged correlates that was similar to the original version (where r = .10,
with the total score for r = .520, p > .001. p < .05; 4). Probably, these lower values maybe due to
the fact that our large-scale sample is composed by a
general population and not only by self-declared Incel.
Discussion
Despite that, the goodness of the model values sug-
The study has presented the first Italian validation of
gests that ITS can be a reliable measure to assess Incel
the ITS questionnaire, a measure for the assessment
of Incel’s personality characteristics developed by characteristics in the population of male, even in those
Scapatura and Boyle (2019) 4. Incels phenomenon is that do not declare themselves as Incel but can be at
growing faster, and due to its political and social impli- risk of join such extremist group. Moreover, the three
cation along with its violent outcomes, both online and factors failure, outcasted and enraged describe the as-
in real life, it has rapidly become a social problem, has pects related to the sense of failure, exclusion, anger
highlighted by the European Commission 11. The ITS and resentment that characterize the perception and
is a quick and easy questionnaire that can help to as- thus the behavior of Incel people 1, overlapping the re-
sess Incel characteristics in the general population, and sults obtained by the original validation, even if those
its good psychometric qualities make it an applicable aspect are grouped in two factors. In particular, failure
tool for studying and screening the phenomenon in our factor reflects the sense of frustration and defeat that
Country. The internal consistency of the three subfac- Incel individual feel about sexual and romantic relation-
tors and the overall score is good and make it a reli- ship, as well as in other aspects of their life, that can
able tool for the evaluation of Incel characteristics. The be a consequence of other mental issues 18. The fac-
CFA showed that the first-order model with failure, out- tor outcasted, instead, describe the feeling of exclusion
casted and enraged factors demonstrated an adequate and rejection that Incels perceive from the society, and
fit, and the factor loading were acceptable, as well as the idea that the society, in particular feminists’ move-
the correlation between factors. Nonetheless, the third ment and left politics, is to blame for their condition. This
factor “enraged” was the psychometrically weakest external locus of control is appeared to be a central as-

117
L. Fontanesi et al.

pect of Incel personality, and it is well detected by the evaluation of this particular form of misogyny is funda-
ITS. Enraged factor, finally, reflects the need for revenge mental to prevent the gender violence and also to avoid
and the resentfulness that permeates the Incel commu- deviant and aggressive behaviors in Incel men.
nity, that can be violently acted upon women and other
targeted minorities 15,19. According to our results, the Acknowledgements
Incel Trait Scale is a reliable measure to assess Incels All Authors have nothing to acknowledge.
personality traits, and can be useful, in conjunction with
Conflict of interest statement
other instruments, to explore and analyzing the phe-
The Authors declare that they have no known compet-
nomenon and early recognize potential risk factors of
ing financial interests or personal relationships that
violent behaviors.
could have appeared to influence the work reported in
Limitations and future directions this paper.
Despite the promising results the present study has
some limitations that have to be addressed. In the first Funding
place, the large sample size is composed by male re- All Authors declare that this research did not receive
cruited from the general population, more in-dept stud- any specific grant from funding agencies in the public,
ies are required to validate the ITS in a population of commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
self-declared Incels. Due to that limitation, the third
Authors’ contributions
factor “enraged” values are acceptable but not excel-
LF: Conceptualization and design of the research, Pro-
lent and more studies on different sample are required
ject Administration, Formal Analysis, Writing-Original
to confirm our three-factors structure. Future studies
Draft, Writing-Review & Editing; GC: Investigation-Data
should also include general personality traits in the vali-
Collection, Writing-Original Draft, Writing-Review & Edit-
dation process in order to further confirm the validity of
the ITS. ing; ADC: Writing-Original Draft, Writing-Review & Edit-
ing; MV: Review & Editing; EAJ: Conceptualization and
design of the research, Writing-Review & Editing; GC:
Conclusions Conceptualization and design of the research, Project
Italian validation of ITS has revealed good psychometric Administration, Writing-Original Draft, Writing-Review &
proprieties for the evaluation of Incels’ personality traits. Editing.
To date, ITS is the only published and useful instrument
to early recognize Incels’ traits and can be easily used Ethical consideration
in research protocol to evaluate Incels’ behavioral and The entire protocol was approved by the Institutional
personality patterns. This psychometric tool will be very Review Board of Psychology of the Department of Psy-
useful to assess the psychopathological risk factors and chological, Health and Territorial Sciences of the Uni-
the behavioral characteristics associated to the Incel’s versity G. d’Annunzio of Chieti-Pescara (nr. 21004).
attitude in the male Italian population. Therefore, the

References 5
Regehr K, In(cel)doctrination: how techno- degli Incel: la costruzione del consenso
1
Cottee S. Incel (E)motives: resentment, logically facilitated misogyny moves vio- politico nella manosfera italiana. Rivista di
shame and revenge. Stud Conflict Terror- lence off screens and on to streets. New Digital Politics 2021;1:379-396. https://doi.
ism 2021;44:93-114. https://doi.org/10.108 Media Soc 2020;24:138-155. https://doi. org/10.53227/101949
0/1057610X.2020.1822589 org/10.1177/1461444820959019 10
Moskalenko S, González JF-G, Kates N, et
2
Preston K, Halpin M, Maguire F. The black
6
Trivers RL. Parental investment and sexual al. Incel Ideology, radicalization and men-
pill: new technology and the male suprem- selection. Foundations of animal behavior: tal health: a survey study. JICW 2022;4:1-
acy of involuntarily celibate men. Men classic papers with commentaries. Chi- 29. https://doi.org/10.21810/jicw.v4i3.3817
Masculin 2021;24:823-841. https://doi. cago, IL, US: University of Chicago Press 11
Directorate-General for Migration and
org/10.1177/1097184X211017954 1996, pp. 795-838. Home Affairs. Incels: a first scan of the
3
Hoffman B, Ware J, Shapiro E. Assessing
7
O’Donnell C, Shor E. This is a political phenomenon (in the EU) and its relevance
the threat of Incel violence. Stud Conflict movement, friend”: Why “incels” support and challenges for P/CVE. 2021.
Terrorism 2020;43:565-587. https://doi.org violence. Brit J Soc 2022;73:336-351. htt- 12
Maxwell D, Robinson SR, Williams J, et al.
/10.1080/1057610X.2020.1751459 ps://doi.org/10.1111/1468-4446.12923 “A Short story of a lonely guy”: a qualita-
4
Scaptura MN, Boyle KM. Masculinity threat,
8
Ging D. Alphas, Betas, and Incels: theoriz- tive thematic analysis of involuntary celi-
“Incel” traits, and violent fantasies among ing the masculinities of the manosphere. bacy using reddit. Sex Cult 2020;24:1852-
heterosexual men in the United States. Men Masculinities 2017;22:638-657. htt- 1874. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12119-020-
Feminist Criminol 2019;15:278-298. htt- ps://doi.org/10.1177/1097184X17706401 09724-6
ps://doi.org/10.1177/1557085119896415 9
Azzolari D, Borodi VM, Garusi D. Il Forum 13
Witt T. If I cannot have it, I will do every-

118
 Italian validation of Incel Trait Scale

thing I can to destroy it. The canonization tervention. B J Psych Advances 2022:1-11. psychiatric disorder and perceived psy-
of Elliot Rodger: ‘Incel’ masculinities, secu- https://doi.org/10.1192/bja.2022.15 chological symptom rates among invol-
lar sainthood, and justifications of ideolog- untary celibates (incels) and their percep-
16
Browne MW, Cudek R. Alternative ways
ical violence. Soc Identities 2020;26:675- tions of mental health treatment. Behav-
of assessing model fit. In: Bollen KA,
689. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504630.20
Ed. Testing structural equation mod- ioral Sciences of Terrorism and Political
20.1787132
els. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Focus Aggression 2022:1-18. https://doi.org/10.1
14
DeCook JR. Castration, the archive, Editions 1993, pp. 136-162. https://doi. 080/19434472.2022.2029933
and the incel wiki. Psychoanal Cult Soc
org/10.1177/0049124192021002005 19
Ciocca G, Tuziak B, Limoncin E, et al. Psy-
2021;26:234-243. https://doi.org/10.1057/
s41282-021-00212-w
17
Kline RB. Methodology in the social sci- choticism, immature defense mechanisms
ences. Principles and practice of structural and a fearful attachment style are associ-
15
Broyd J, Boniface L, Parsons D, et al., In-
equation modeling (3rd Ed.). New York: ated with a higher homophobic attitude. J
cels, violence and mental disorder: a narra-
tive review with recommendations for best Guilford Press 2011. Sex Med 2015;12:1953-1960. https://doi.
practice in risk assessment and clinical in- 18
Speckhard A, Ellenberg M. Self-reported org/10.1111/jsm.12975

119