Much of Socarides' career was devoted to studying homosexuality. He has been grouped with Irving Bieber and Lionel Ovesey as the main representatives of the U.S. psychoanalytical current that has been active in promoting analytical methods to 'cure' homosexuality.[3][1] Socarides postulated that homosexuality was a neurotic adaptation, and that it could be treated so as to turn gay people straight.[1] He wrote that male homosexuality typically develops in the first two years of life, during the pre-Oedipal stage of a boy's personality formation. In his view, it is caused by a controlling mother who prevents her son from separating from her, and a weak or rejecting father who does not serve as a role model for his son or support his efforts to escape from the mother.[4][5]
Socarides was the father of five children: a son, Richard Socarides, from his first marriage; a daughter, also from his first marriage; two children from his second marriage; and one from his fourth marriage, with Claire Alford Socarides. Richard, who is gay, was Bill Clinton's Senior Advisor for Public Liaison for gay and lesbian issues.[8]
Socarides, Charles W. (1968). The Overt Homosexual. Jason Aronson, Inc. ISBN0-87668-162-3.
Socarides, Charles W. (1975). Beyond Sexual Freedom. New York Times/Quadrangle Books. ISBN0-8129-0532-6.
Socarides, Charles W.; & Kramer, Selma (1975). Work and Its Inhibitions: Psychoanalytic Essays. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-6866-5.
Socarides, Charles W. (1977). The World of Emotions: Clinical Studies of Affects and Their Expression. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-6867-3.
Socarides, Charles W.; & Karasu, Toksoz B. (1979). On Sexuality: Psychoanalytic Observations. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-3857-X.
Socarides, Charles W. (1988). Preoedipal Origin and Psychoanalytic Therapy of Sexual Perversions. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-4287-9.
Socarides, Charles W. (1989). Homosexuality: Psychoanalytic Therapy. Jason Aronson, Inc. ISBN0-87668-814-8. First published in 1978 under the title Homosexuality.
Volkan, Vamik D.; & Socarides, Charles W. (1990). The Homosexualities: Reality, Fantasy, and the Arts. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-2347-5.
Volkan, Vamik D.; & Socarides, Charles W. (1991). The Homosexualities and the Therapeutic Process. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-2348-3.
Socarides, Charles W. (1992). Sexual Politics and Scientific Logic: The Issue of Homosexuality. Association for Psychohistory. ASIN B0006RCH62.
Socarides, Charles W. (1995). Homosexuality: A Freedom Too Far. A Psychoanalyst Answers 1000 Questions About Causes and Cure and the Impact of the Gay Rights Movement on American Society. Roberkai. ISBN0-9646642-5-9.
Socarides, Charles W.; & Freedman, Abraham (2002). Objects of Desire: The Sexual Deviations. International Universities Press. ISBN0-8236-3731-X.
Loeb, Loretta L.; & Socarides, Charles W. (2004). The Mind of the Paedophile: Psychoanalytic Perspectives. Karnac. ISBN1-85575-970-5.
^Socarides, Charles W. (1995). Homosexuality: A Freedom Too Far. A Psychoanalyst Answers 1000 Questions About Causes and Cure and the Impact of the Gay Rights Movement on American Society (2nd ed.). Phoenix, Arizona: Adam Margrave Books. pp. 13–14. ISBN0-9646642-5-9. "The homosexual rights movement claims a freedom to alter that basic design [of the family], to assert that all forms of sexual relations are equal and indistinguishable. But this freedom, I submit, is not ours to fulfill. It is a freedom that goes too far, because it undoes us all. It is a freedom that seeks to overturn not only the history of the human race, but to subvert its future as well - a freedom that dares to re-form the most basic institution of society, the nuclear family, an institution that is written in our natures, and evolved over eons."