Tearoom Trade

Tearoom Trade: Impersonal Sex in Public Places, by Laud Humphreys, was first published in 1970. The text examined the subject of men who had had sex in public restrooms, or “tearooms.” The prize-winning text was immediately controversial and has remained so, becoming essential for students of sociology and readers of sociology and research methods texts. The text's infamy owes more to the research methods deployed by Humphreys, rather than the results found, with Humphreys's text cited as an example of covert and deceptive research methods that may have endangered subjects.

Humphreys described in Tearoom Trade how his PhD advisor had asked him in 1965, “But where does the average guy go just to get a blow job?” Humphreys's search for an answer to that question led to his study of impersonal sex, which was conducted over 2 years, commencing in the spring of 1966.

Humphreys had previously made informal observations of tearoom activities in New York, Chicago, St. Louis, Kansas City, Des Moines, Tulsa, Denver, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, but for Tearoom

[Page 827]Trade, he focused on a series of public park tearooms in St. Louis, Missouri. For 2 years, he acted as a voyeur/ lookout or “watch queen.” In this role, Humphreys warned those engaged in tearoom sexual activities of approaching individuals and presented himself as someone deriving pleasure from observing others engaging in sexual acts. Through this role, Humphreys was able to remain within the tearoom as an accepted observer without engaging in sexual acts himself. In turn, this allowed him to observe the encounters and record copious field notes.

In addition to producing field notes, Humphreys also recorded the details of 134 participants' automobiles. He then used this information together with public records to find the addresses of the plate owners and visited them in person. He posed as a survey interviewer on mental health, having changed his appearance from his earlier tearoom observations. Humphreys completed 50 interviews in the year after his initial observations. These controversial interviews and issues of privacy have remained the focus of much criticism.

As a result of these observations, Humphreys identified a series of ritualistic gestures that took place in order for successful sexual activity to occur. These stages began with “approaching,” in which a man circled the outside of the tearoom or observed it from a distance, in order to see other individuals entering the venue. Upon entering the tearoom, an individual undertook the “positioning” stage, choosing a urinal or cubicle to occupy. This was then followed by “signaling,” in which a man moved a little back from a urinal or through eye contact signaled his interest to another man and the role he was seeking to perform. Then, the stage of “maneuvering” took place, in which a man changed his position in the room, for example, moving closer to another rest-room occupant. “Contracting” was the next stage, in which a form of commitment took place, typically involving touching the other man's penis or stepping into a lavatory stall. This stage was sometimes followed by “foreplay,” to maintain arousal. The final stage was the “payoff,” consisting of the final sexual act, which may or may not have involved anal penetration. This ritualistic framework was important for establishing that men were not coerced into sexual activity within a restroom.

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