BeMoreKinky research
How submissive are doms?
Doms are not automatically low in submission. A strong dominant appetite can sit beside anything from no interest in submitting to a serious submissive streak.
There is no fixed amount. A dom can have no interest in submitting, a private curiosity or a serious submissive streak. On our BDSM test, dominant and submissive interests behaved more like two separate dials than opposite ends of one scale. Turning the dominant dial up did not automatically turn the submissive one down.
Dom describes the authority somebody likes to take. It is not a promise that they will never hand it over. A submissive side may be central to how they identify, reserved for one person, or an occasional craving they have no wish to put on a name badge.
From the data
Dominant and submissive results overlap only a little
How much the two results have in common: 6% to 15%. The Dominant and Submissive test results shared this much of their variation. Most of each result was separate.
A dom can still want to submit
The tidy version of BDSM roles puts dominant at one end, submissive at the other and switch parked in the middle. Move towards dominance and submission must retreat by the same amount. Easy to picture. A poor fit for our test results.
The results look more like two dials. The dominant dial is the appetite for taking authority and deciding where a scene goes. The submissive dial is the pull towards yielding authority and following somebody else's lead. A dominant result tells us little about where the submissive result will land.
Picture a dom who loves setting rules and watching a submissive respond. None of that prevents them from wanting one night where somebody else makes the decisions. They may enjoy surrender precisely because it is rare. Or they may have one partner who can bring it out of them while everyone else meets the very familiar dominant version.
A dom can be strongly dominant without having a blank space where submission might be. Their dominant appetite tells us what they reliably want. It does not give us a complete inventory of everything else that can get them off.
Being dominant during sex doesn't mean being dominant in everyday life
People often smuggle ordinary personality into this question. A confident manager must be a dom. A quiet person must be submissive. Then everyone acts surprised when the terrifyingly efficient organiser wants to be told exactly what to do after the bedroom door closes.
Kink roles are about erotic authority, not a personality test in leather trousers. Kate Jansen, Adam Fried and Jared Chamberlain found that dominant, switch and submissive groups differed in everyday interpersonal dominance, but the groups still overlapped substantially. Role and everyday manner can be connected without being the same thing.
Practitioners interviewed by Ali Hébert and Angela Weaver described dominance through control and responsibility. Submission involved giving up control and pleasing. Those descriptions are about what a person is doing inside a power exchange. They are much more useful than asking who is bossy at brunch.
A dom can want submission without disproving their dominant identity. Receiving orders asks something different of them. It can offer release from responsibility, a chance to serve, or the particular thrill of being handled by someone whose authority they actually want.
Wanting to dominate and submit doesn't mean you have to call yourself a switch
Once both dials are visible, the obvious label is switch. Sometimes that is exactly the right word. It is not compulsory.
A switch takes both dominant and submissive roles, but switching itself comes in many shapes. Theodore Bennett's work with switches found that many leaned towards one role or switched only with particular partners and in particular situations. A dominant-leaning switch can be unmistakably dominant most of the time and still claim both sides without hesitation.
Another dom might have a submissive fantasy but no wish to enact it. One may submit so rarely that "switch" feels misleading. Someone else may love bottoming for pain while keeping hold of authority. Bottom and submissive are not synonyms. The act, the power dynamic and the identity label can point in different directions.
A dom with submissive desire does not need to be reclassified. Some want to hand over authority; others want a particular sensation while keeping hold of it. A fantasy that belongs to one partner says something different from a role they want throughout their kink life.
For one dom, submission may be a specific exception: orders from a trusted person, or an evening without decisions after holding the dynamic all week. The surrender can be real without becoming their usual role.
Some doms never want to submit. Others discover that surrender has been sitting there quietly, waiting for somebody worth surrendering to. Neither answer makes their dominance less real. The title on their profile can stay "dom"; the person kneeling knows exactly what is happening.