Scholar presents Catherine Bement Davis’s study that reframed views of women’s sexuality

Anya Jabor, a professor of history at the University of Montana, described the career and research of Catherine Bement Davis during a public event at the Missoula Public Library. Jabor said Davis moved from prison reform work to large-scale scientific study that, Jabor said, “redefined normal sexual behavior” in the early 20th century.

Jabor outlined Davis’s trajectory from teacher to the first superintendent of the Bedford Hills reformatory for women and later head of the Bureau of Social Hygiene, a Rockefeller-funded organization. At Bedford, Jabor quoted Davis’s condition for taking the job: “I will only accept it if I can run it as an educational institution. I have no interest in being the warden of a prison.” Jabor said Davis later used statistical methods and large-sample surveys to study the sexual lives of women who were, by the standards of the time, considered “average.”

Jabor said Davis selected a large but nonrepresentative sample—about 1,000 married women and 1,200 unmarried women—and asked extensive survey questions on sexual desire, contraceptive use, menstrual periodicity, childhood sexual play, and same-sex relationships. Jabor said Davis reported notably high rates of contraceptive use, nonreproductive sexual activity, and same-sex relationships among the women surveyed, findings that directly challenged early-20th-century assumptions that most women lacked sexual desire outside of marriage.

The historian connected Davis’s work to the political and legal context. Jabor noted the Comstock Act, a federal law that restricted distribution of information about contraception and abortion, limited public discussion and service provision at the time; she also cited Davis’s role in the American plan during World War I and her later support—often private—of birth-control work. Jabor said Davis published Factors in the Sex Life of 2,200 Women in 1929 and that chapters about same-sex relationships were among the most controversial.

Jabor also discussed Davis’s complicated public record: early in her career Davis supervised institutions that incarcerated women for so-called morality offenses and later became an advocate for scientifically based sex education and birth control. Jabor said Rockefeller funding and institutional politics factored into both Davis’s research opportunities and the professional setbacks she later suffered.

The presentation closed with Jabor noting Davis’s influence on later researchers and public debates about sexuality. The event included time for questions and a brief preview of related exhibits and book sales planned around the Missoula Bridal 2025 program.