The socialization of homosexuality and heterosexuality in a non-Western society.

Data on the Sambia--a tribe living in Papua New Guinea--are presented to demonstrate how Sambia males develop a homosexual orientation in boyhood and adolescence, then switch to become heterosexuals in adulthood. Social learning theory is used to explain how sexual orientation in the Sambia change from homo- to heterosexual during the transition to adulthood. Whereas most learning analyses of sexual orientation are based on data from Western cultures, this manuscript extends that literature to deal with a non-Western culture. While including Pavlovian and operant conditioning, which is stressed in many learning analyses of sexual learning, the present analysis also includes detail on the social and cognitive learning principles that are important in understanding the learning of sexual orientation and behavior.