You have full access to this open access article. Symbiosexuality, the individual experience of attraction to people in relationships, has not been examined as a lived experience. Lack of recognition and examination of symbiosexuality is surprising when one considers studies of romantic and sexual desires and behaviors associated with more than two people.
Also evident in the existence of the sexual identity label known as the unicorn and easily found in essays, memoirs, and dating apps, this attraction proves salient. Further, we find evidence of symbiosexuality outside Western discourses on desire and sexuality. Dominant conceptions and assumptions about sexuality and desire including mononormativity, respectability politics within polyamorous communities, and current conceptions of desire within western discourse contribute to symbiosexual invisibility.
This invisibility harms several sexual minority groups, especially women and gender minorities within these groups. The purpose of this review is to describe and provide evidence of the phenomenon of symbiosexuality. In a recent essay in Vanity Fair , Caroline Giuliani writes about exploring her sexuality through her experiences with dating couples. Giuliani describes herself as a unicorn, a term for a person who engages in sexual and romantic dynamics with couples Johnston, She explains,.
A unicorn not only dates the individuals, but also dates the relationship. This third force to flirt with is undoubtedly the most interesting one p. The proliferation of labels in Western conceptions of sexual orientation beyond homosexual and heterosexual in the twenty-first century opened space for, and increased the visibility of, a range of erotic possibilities.
As social and academic discourses embrace the existence of multiple, multidimensional, and fluid orientations of desire, binary assumptions about sexual attraction and orientation soften Diamond, , ; Jordan-Young, ; Van Anders, Increasingly hard to ignore in modern sexual behaviors and relationship practices, such as threesomes and three-person relationships, is the experience of attraction to relationships between people. Until recently, this attraction lacked a term in academic discourse.
