Alfred Kinsey

Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956) was a US biologist and psychologist most known for his research regarding human sexual behavior. He and his research staff collected over 18,000 interviews with men and women about their sexual behaviors, actions, taboos, and desires. His research was considered controversial at the time and he debunked many misconceptions about sexuality including pervasive ideas about females such as that they weren't sexual and didn't have desires the same way that men do. He founded the Institute for Sex Research at the University of Indiana (which is now known as the Kinsey Institute) and was one the forerunners in the field of sexology. His books "Sexual Behavior in the Human Male" (1948) and "Sexual Behavior in the Human Female" (1953) were groundbreaking in the field of human sexuality and human behavior in general. He developed the Kinsey scale of sexual orientation in which 0 represented exclusive heterosexuality and 6 represented exclusive homosexuality.