Partialism is a
Sexual fetishism with a focus on any other specific parts of the body other than the
Human genitals.
[Milner, J. S., & Dopke, C. A. (1997). Paraphilia Not Otherwise Specified: Psychopathology and theory. In D. R. Laws and W. O'Donohue (Eds.), Sexual deviance: Theory, assessment, and treatment. New York: Guilford.] Partialism is categorized as a fetishistic disorder in the DSM-5 of the American Psychiatric Association only if it causes significant psychosocial distress for the person or has detrimental effects on important areas of their life. In the
DSM-IV, it was considered a separate
paraphilia (
Paraphilia NOS), but was merged into fetishistic disorder by the DSM-5.
Individuals who exhibit partialism sometimes describe the anatomy of interest to them as having equal or greater erotic attraction for them than do the genitals.
[Kunjukrishnan, R., Pawlak, A., & Varan, L R. (1988). The clinical and forensic psychiatric issues of retifism. Canadian Journal of Psychiatry, 33, 819–825.]
Types
The following are some of the partialisms commonly found among people:
See also
