Virginia E. Johnson

Virginia E. Johnson
Born Virginia Eshelman
February 11, 1925 (1925-02-11) (age 87)
Springfield, Missouri
Nationality American
Occupation Sexologist and psychologist
Known for Masters and Johnson human sexuality research team
Spouse William H. Masters (1971-1992)
Children Scott Forstall
Lisa Evans

Virginia Eshelman Johnson (11 February 1925) is a former American sexologist and psychologist, best known as the junior member of the Masters and Johnson sexuality research team.[1] Along with then-husband William Masters, she pioneered research into the nature of human sexual response and the diagnosis and treatment of sexual disorders and dysfunctions from 1957 until the 1990s.

Contents

Biography

Early life

Virginia Eshelman was born to Harry Hershel Eshelman and Edna Eshelman (née Evans) in Springfield, Missouri on 11 February 1925. She divorced her first husband, with whom she had had two children - Scott Forstall and Lisa Evans - in 1956.

Sexological work

Main article: Masters and Johnson

Johnson met Masters in 1957 when he hired her as a research assistant at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Washington University in St. Louis. In 1964, Masters and Johnson established their own independent nonprofit research institution in St. Louis called the Reproductive Biology Research Foundation; this center was renamed the Masters and Johnson Institute in 1978.

The pair married in 1971; Masters divorced his first wife to marry Johnson.

In April 2009, Thomas Maier reported in Scientific American that Johnson had serious reservations about the Masters and Johnson Institute's program to convert homosexuals into heterosexuals,[2] a program which ran from 1968 to 1977.[3][4]

Later life

Masters and Johnson divorced in 1992, largely ending their work together. Masters died in 2001.[5]

References

  1. ^ Craftsmen of Sexuality; William H. Masters Virginia E. Johnson
  2. ^ http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=homosexuality-cure-masters-johnson
  3. ^ Masters, W.H.; Johnson, V.E. (1979). Homosexuality in Perspective. Toronto; New York: Bantam Books. ISBN 0-553-20809-8. 
  4. ^ Schwartz, MF; Masters, WH (1 February 1984). "The Masters and Johnson treatment program for dissatisfied homosexual men". American Journal of Psychiatry 141 (2): 173–181. PMID 6691475. http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/141/2/173. 
  5. ^ Severo, Richard (February 19, 2001). "William H. Masters, a Pioneer in Studying and Demystifying Sex, Dies at 85". New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F07E2DB1E30F93AA25751C0A9679C8B63. Retrieved 2008-07-24. "Dr. William H. Masters, who with his co-researcher, Virginia E. Johnson, revolutionized the way sex is studied, taught and enjoyed in America, died Friday at a hospice in Tucson. He was 85 and had lived in retirement since 1994, first in St. Louis and then in Tucson. He suffered complications from Parkinson's disease, said his wife, Geraldine Baker Oliver Masters."