AUSTRALIA — Ask the average person if they like a little spanking, biting, wrist holding, role play, or even blindfolding in their sex life and many will serve up a shy or enthusiastic affirmation. Ask those same folks if they’re into BDSM and they’ll likely claim disgust at the very idea.What’s the difference?

Australian researchers have uncovered what those in the United States have also found to be true: unless tapped into a self-identified kinky community, most people who at least occasionally enjoy dominance, submission, or SM-type activities absolutely resist having them identified as BDSM.

This was only one of several revelations discovered during Australia’s first national survey of the nation’s fetish habits, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.

The phone survey of 20,000 men and women let researchers know that two-percent of Australian men and 1.4-percent of Australian women have added a little spice to their naked romping during the past year.

Head researcher, Dr. Juliet Richters of the University of New South Wales thinks the real numbers are likely to be higher. “There will definitely be more men and women who have sexual tastes in this direction but won’t call it this,” she explained to the press. “They might not like sex magazines, but they just happen to like being tied up and spanked as part of foreplay.”

But don’t ask them if they think that’s BDSM, because “they’ll say ‘Yuck, no,” according to the good doctor.

This will be among the findings presented at the World Association of Sexual Health congress being held in Sydney this week. Also on the table will be the fact that gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and bi-curious individuals are more likely to admit fetish desires or behavior, the under-20 female crowd and women without live-in partners are more attracted to BDSM behavior, and those likely to participate in such saucy sensuality are also more likely to try other things, including phone and anal sex, online porn, and sex toys.

Additionally, Richters’ crew found that BDSM positive responders were not any more likely than the average Australian to have experienced sexual abuse, coercion, anxiety, or difficulties. On the contrary, men who admit enjoying kinky games were considerably more likely to have higher psychological wellbeing scores than were those who claimed to like it mild.

“It might be that they’re more in harmony with themselves because they’re into something unusual and are comfortable with that,” Richters conjectured. “There’s a lot to be said for accepting who you are.”

These are words that at least some male participants in the study might take to heart, given that those who were found to be the least happy were men who did not identify as gay but found themselves resisting attractions to other men.