Gaining the Upper Hand? Further Evidence of Pain as a Pleasurable Experience and the Unexpected Relationship Between Sadomasochistic Sexual Preference and Chronic Pain.

We demonstrated a significantly elevated chronic pain prevalence of around 47% in individuals with sadomasochistic sexual preference, ruling out previously discussed sampling biases. Possibly, sadomasochistic practise is used as a coping strategy by some chronic pain patients. We further presented a model of pain-related and psychological variables explaining around 42% of variance in sadomasochistic sexual preference in general. The results are discussed in terms of their potential to inform pain management strategies.