The Rise of Praise Kinks: Why Everyone's Suddenly Into Being Told They're 'Good'
- Amanda Sandström Beijer
- 16 minutes ago
- 5 min read
The filthiest thing to say in bed right now is… “good job.” Not a slur, not a command barked through gritted teeth. Just the kind of compliment your elementary school teacher would give you for coloring inside the lines—only this time your nervous system does a swan dive into horniness.
Welcome to the praise kink moment. Call it verbal aftercare, erotic gold stars, horny performance reviews. Being told you’re “such a good boy/ girl” or “doing so well” isn’t just nice—it’s a switch. And before you roll your eyes like, great, another algorithm-invented fetish, the search data and therapists’ calendars are overbooked with people who melt at a well-timed “yes, just like that.”
Confession: I used to think praise was corny. Then someone whispered “you’re perfect right now” and my prefrontal cortex threw confetti.
What Actually Is a Praise Kink?
Let’s be specific. A praise kink isn’t “I enjoy compliments” in the same way that a martini isn’t just olives in water. It’s when approval—verbal, explicit,thusiastic—links directly to arousal. Your body hears “you’re doing so well,” your heart rate spikes, your skin warms, your brain queues dopamine like a club door girl who owes you a favor.
Think of it as positive reinforcement meets erotic attention. Some people are touch-first or sight-first. Praise kink people are word-first. It’s not poetry; it’s Pavlov with manners.
The Numbers Don't Lie: This Isn't Just Hype
If “praise kink” were a coin, it would have mooned in 2021 and never really crashed. Google Trends went vertical. # praisekink on TikTok turned into a public group therapy session meets thirst trap. Meanwhile, sex therapists keep hearing the same thing: “I didn’t know this was a thing until someone said ‘good girl’ and my legs negotiated their own contract.”
This isn’t just visibility; it’s vocabulary. The desire was always there—whispered in kink circles and pillow talk—now it’s got a tag and a million stitch videos.
Why Now? The Perfect Storm of Validation Hunger
We are very tired, very online, and very measured. Likes, KPIs, ghosting, layoffs, perform-your-intimacy culture—everyone’s quietly starving for clean, uncomplicated yes. Praise kinks deliver that yes in the most exposed moment possible. Not a heart emoji. A live, embodied, “you’re doing amazing.” It lands in the body like a meal after a week of snacks.
Generational flavor matters too. Many of us grew up on constant feedback and then graduated into economic chaos. We learned to audit ourselves for performance and still felt under-reviewed. A praise kink is like taking that need and making it consensual, hot, and actually satisfying.
Culturally, we’re also in our attachment-theory era. Therapy-speak escaped the clinic and now lives on your For You page. Of course we eroticized reassurance. We eroticize everything eventually.
The Psychology: It's Not Just About Sex
There’s the obvious story—uneven childhood praise, perfectionism, the little kid who waited for “I’m proud of you” and learned to chase it. But it’s not just trauma dress-up. Attachment-wise, anxious folks often crave clear signals of acceptance. During sex, praise is a foghorn of safety: I want you. Right now. Exactly like this.
Neurochemically, approval hits the dopamine slot machine. Stack that with oxytocin and endorphins already in play and you’ve got a beautifully legal drug cocktail. No wonder a single “good” can feel as potent as a whole new position.
Vulnerable admission: the first time someone said “you’re enough,” I almost cried mid-makeout. Not because I’m fragile—because my nervous system finally exhaled.
How Praise Kinks Actually Show Up in Practice
Praise shows up with different flavors:
The Encouragement Enthusiast: performance-based cheerleading (“that feels incredible,” “you’re doing so well,” “stay right there”)
The Affirmation Seeker: identity-forward compliments (“you’re gorgeous,” “you’re perfect,” “good girl/boy”)
The Service-Oriented: pleasure-mirroring (“you make me feel so good,” “no one does it like you”)
The difference between liking compliments and having a praise kink is intensity and centrality. If the right words can spike your arousal faster than a new toy? If you structure scenes around getting or giving those words? That’s kink territory.
Consent footnote (because we’re adults): agree on phrases, tone, and boundaries eforehand. Praise is safest when it’s specific.
Praise Kinks vs. Degradation: Not Actually Opposites
Plot twist: praise and degradation aren’t enemies; they’re siblings who chose different electives. Both are about high-focus verbal stimulation and power play. One builds you up; the other breaks you down (consensually). Plenty of people like both depending on mood, partner, or scene.
A well-placed “good girl” can hit like champagne. A consensual “you filthy thing” can hit like whiskey. Same bar, different buzz. The throughline is attention—undivided, electric, for-you attention.
The Power Exchange Element
Praise often carries a power vibe. The giver takes a dominant or caregiving role—coach, mentor, worshipper—while the receiver relaxes into being seen and guided. Sometimes it flips: a “dominant” glows under “you’re doing so well,” because authority also craves affirmation. Humans are messy like that.
Compared to harder-edge dynamics, praise play can feel gentler and deeply regulating, which makes it an accessible entry point for folks kink-curious but needle-shy about pain or humiliation.
Self-Esteem, Healing, and Sex-Positivity
There’s a reason therapists are not mad at this. Praise can be corrective emotional experience masquerading as foreplay. If your inner monologue is a hater, erotic affirmation is a counter-spell. It’s basically CBT with lube: identify the belief (“I’m not enough”), interrupt it (“you’re perfect like this”), anchor it in sensation (hello, oxytocin).
Some clinicians even give homework: compliment scripts, reflective listening, aftercare praise. Not performative. Specific. Credible. Pleasure with receipts.
The Spectrum of Praise: From Vanilla to Kink
Not everyone who likes a “you feel amazing” has a praise kink. It’s a spectrum. For some, words are nice-to-have. For others, they’re the main event.
Ask yourself:
Do certain phrases switch you on without touch?
Do you feel safer, hotter, more present when you’re explicitly affirmed?
Do you prep lines in your Notes app? (No shame. Poets have done worse.)
If yes, welcome to the club. Bring boundaries and a safeword; leave the self-consciousness at the door.
Praise kinks make perfect sense in a culture that monetizes our insecurity. They’re a rebellion that doesn’t look like one: rather than chasing external approval until you burn out, you negotiate it, ritualize it, and let it touch your body. You get to be told you’re good—and you get to believe it.
In a world calibrated to whisper “not enough,” hearing “you’re so good” isn’t just hot. It’s medicine. And if that medicine gets you off? Honestly, cheers to efficiency.
