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Why women moan during sex

featured, Sexual Health

Why women moan during sex

2012-03-09

All you have to do is watch nearly any depiction of female orgasm on screen to get an idea of how a woman is “supposed” to react during sex.

From “When Harry Met Sally” to “Sex and the City” to your basic porn film, women in the throes of passion aren’t just shouting their ecstasy from the rooftops – they’re moaning with pleasure. Loudly.

But is this just cinematic license, or is there really something to noisy sex?

Experts wondered the same thing. Last year, Gayle Brewer of the University of Central Lancashire and Colin Hendrie of the University of Leeds published their research on the topic – technically known as “copulatory vocalization” – in the Archives of Sexual Behavior. In the study, they asked 71 sexually active heterosexual women between ages 18 and 48 for more details about vocalization during sex.

The researchers found that many of the women did make noise, but not necessarily while they were having an orgasm. Instead, 66% said that they moaned to speed up their partner’s climax, and 87% stated that they vocalized during sex to boost his self-esteem.

Are female orgasms really just a ‘bonus’?

“While female orgasms were most commonly experienced during foreplay, copulatory vocalizations were reported to be made most often before and simultaneously with male ejaculation,” write the researchers. Women also reported making noise to relieve boredom, fatigue and pain/discomfort during sex.

So is female vocalization during sex just a performance for a guy’s benefit? (After all, Meg Ryan’s over-the-top moans were meant to prove a point to “Harry” that men are easily duped by a fake orgasm.)

“There isn’t a lot of research in this area,” says Kristen Mark, a sexuality researcher at Indiana University, “but we’re bombarded with images through mainstream media that tell us moaning is associated with orgasm and sexual pleasure. So it would be a fairly wise faking strategy to moan since men already tend to associate moaning with orgasm.”

Of course, there’s nothing smart about faking it.

“If you’re faking an orgasm, you are signaling to your partner that he is doing everything right, when in fact he isn’t,” says sex educator and author Patty Brisben. “Use moaning as a way of signaling that you are excited and things really are feeling good, not as a way to hide that they aren’t.”

Fake or not, women aren’t the only primates who vocalize during sex. Research in the animal kingdom reveals that female baboons, for example, have a variety of copulation calls, which appear to relate to their fertility: The vocalizations tend to become more complex when the females are closer to ovulation, and also vary when a female is mating with a higher-ranked male baboon. And female macaque monkeys give a shout to help trigger their mates’ orgasm, too.

Performances and primatologists aside, vocalizing during sex can actually be a great tool to help women get what they want in bed. As I discussed in my column a couple of weeks ago on the topic of talking about sex, it isn’t always easy to translate sexual thought into action, so a little strategic moaning can definitely help get the point across.

“Women are learning to take responsibility for their own sexual needs and wants in the bedroom,” explains Brisben. “We need to take this one step further and give ourselves permission to become teachers. Use vocalization to teach your partner what feels good. It can help you say, ‘stop, go, yes, more please’ – without sounding like a traffic cop.”

And when it comes to noise, “partner benefit isn’t the only piece of the puzzle,” says Kristen Mark. “Perhaps making noise turns some women on and helps them experience pleasure.”

Brisben concurs: “I think there are many women who need to be vocal to help themselves achieve orgasm – it helps move them and their orgasm along. There are certainly phases. As a woman gets into it, she may become extremely vocal, and then move into a period of quiet as she is on the verge.”

So do what feels right to you. Any other benefits are just a great bonus. And when it comes to “copulatory vocalization,” perhaps men should take a lesson from the ladies.

“Women understand that moaning is a turn-on for guys, and many women ultimately enjoy it because they’ve made an effort to push a little beyond what comes naturally,” says Logan Levkoff, a sex educator and author of a guide for men entitled “How To Get Your Wife to Have Sex With You.”

“But sexual self-esteem is a two-way street, and, for their part during sex, guys should aim for more than a single grunt at the end. It’s not about faking or doing something you don’t want to, but more about being sexually present and in sync with each other.”

So let’s all make some noise.
Post by: Ian Kerner Ph.D. – sex counselor

Is Your Cell Phone Making You a Jerk?

Psycological Health

Is Your Cell Phone Making You a Jerk?

2012-03-07

Cell phones keep us socially connected, but new research suggests they actually reduce users’ social consciousness. In fact, the study showed that cell phone use was linked to more selfish behavior.

Researchers from the University of Maryland’s Robert H. Smith School of Business found that after a short period of cell phone use, people were less likely to partake in “prosocial” behavior — actions that are intended to help another person or society — compared with a control group. For example, after using a cell phone, study participants were more likely to turn down volunteer opportunities and were less persistent in completing word problems, even though they knew their answers would provide money for charity.

The same drop in prosocial tendencies occurred even when participants were simply asked draw a picture of their cell phones and think about using them.

The study involved college men and women in their 20s, but the researchers think the findings would apply to any group.

So why would an innocuous thing like making a cell phone call make a person less giving? The researchers think it has to do with feelings of social connectedness. All humans have a fundamental need to connect with others — but once that need is met, say by using a cell phone, it naturally reduces our inclination to feel empathy or engage in helping behavior toward others. “The cell phone directly evokes feelings of connectivity to others, thereby fulfilling the basic human need to belong,” said study author and marketing professor Rosellina Ferraro in a statement.

Previous research shores up the theory. In October, researchers at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University looked at the effect of social support on people’s attitudes toward others outside of their social circle. The researchers found that those who had a strong sense of belonging to a social circle were more likely to “dehumanize” other groups and more likely to treat them unkindly.

Healthland’s Maia Szalavitz reported at the time:

“[S]ocial connection is sort of like eating. When you are hungry, you seek out food. When you are lonely, you seek social connection. When the experience of social connection is elevated, we feel socially ‘full’ and have less desire to seek out other people and see them in a way that treats them as essentially human,” [says lead author Adam Waytz].

A similar psychology may affect our everyday interactions. “People talk about being overextended, having too many dinner dates, coffee dates, meetings. They feel depleted,” says Waytz. “We think this plays into our findings. Even though you are extremely socially connected, at some point, it comes at the expense of the ability to consider the full humanity of those around you.”

Waytz and his colleagues also noted that when people feel they are included in a social circle, it encourages a sense of exclusivity — a feeling of “us versus them.” That increases our tendency to view those on the outside of the circle as somehow less human and less worthy of receiving our charitable attention.

The authors of the current study further tested people’s feelings of social connectedness stemming from use of other social media like Facebook, and found that they tended to feel more connected after using their cell phones than after using Facebook. “Given the increasing pervasiveness of cellphones, it does have the potential to have broad social implications,” Ferraro said.

Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2012/02/20/is-your-cell-phone-making-you-a-jerk/?iid=hl-main-feature#ixzz1oQrynGiT

Are you sexually intelligent?

featured, Sexual Health

Are you sexually intelligent?

2012-03-06

What are the qualities that make a truly great lover?

Is it about being able to swing from chandeliers or knowing every page of the “Kama Sutra” by heart? Or are there deeper qualities to being “good in bed” that speak more to the spirit of our actions than their substance?

In his new book, “Sexual Intelligence,” Marty Klein, Ph.D – a renowned sex therapist with more than 30 years of experience – challenges readers to think about their sex lives as though they suddenly woke up in Russia tomorrow, without any knowledge of the language and only a handful of rubles in their pockets.

“To figure out what to do, you’d need more than knowledge – you would need intelligence,” he writes. “You’d need the ability to figure out what questions to ask, how to find people who can help you, how to make decisions in a different culture, and so on.

“That’s what sexual intelligence is like – not the ability to be great in bed, or to function the way you did when you were 22. Rather, sexual intelligence is expressed in the ability to create and maintain desire in a situation that’s less than perfect or comfortable; the capacity to adapt to your changing body; curiosity and open-mindedness about the meaning of pleasure, closeness, and satisfaction; and the ability to adjust when things don’t go as expected.”

Klein builds on his premise of sexual intelligence by offering us a beguilingly simple equation: sexual intelligence = information + emotional skills + body awareness.

Accurate information is indeed crucial. Many of us get our sexual information from all the wrong sources.

Young men too often rely on porn and tall tales of the locker room, or on the responses of women who are all-too willing to fake it rather than put their true desires in the foreground; whereas women often rely on the sound bytes that proliferate talk shows.

In terms of emotional skills, as I discussed in last week’s column, being able to communicate empathetically and honestly with a sexual partner is paramount, but many of us resign ourselves to sex lives of quiet desperation.

And I agree with Klein’s calculus that only by adding body awareness – not just of your own body, but also of your partner’s – can you hope to become truly sexually intelligent.

In my experience as a sex counselor, one way of cultivating all three of these qualities at once with a partner is through the practice of sensate focus exercises.

Developed by sex researchers William Masters and Virginia Johnson, these exercises, as the name implies, emphasize the focus on physical sensations.

In sensate focus, sex is initially taken off the table for couples, and then gradually reintroduced, one aspect at time, through a gradual process of touching, connection, and awareness, during which each partner takes turns as giver and receiver.

The object of these exercises is for partners to develop a heightened sense of sexual self-awareness and a keener understanding of what feels good to their partner.

People change. Relationships change. Why shouldn’t sex? And yet it’s the natural changes of the sexual life cycle that so many couples in long-term relationships find bedeviling — and that’s another reason why sexual intelligence is so important.

In her international best-seller “Mating in Captivity,” therapist and intellectual provocateur Esther Perel encourages readers to cultivate “erotic intelligence” and reconcile the need for what’s safe and predictable with the wish to pursue what’s exciting, mysterious and awe-inspiring.

“We are born sensuous; we become erotic. To cultivate the erotic is also to engage with sexuality as a quality of aliveness and vitality that extend beyond a mere repertoire of sexual techniques. We learn to play, be curious, engage with our imagination, anticipate. Erotic intelligence is our ability to bring novelty to the enduring, mystery to the familiar, and surprise to the known.”

Both Klein and Perel have authored important works that are not only apt for people of all ages, but can remain relevant on our bookshelves (or digital readers) throughout our lives as we age and adapt.

“Sexual intelligence is useful in different ways at different times of our life,” writes Klein. “In our 20s, in exploring the sexual world; in our 30s, in bonding with a partner and establishing a sexual rhythm; in our 40s, in tolerating and adapting to change; in our 50s, in saying goodbye to youthful sex; in our 60s and beyond, in creating a new sexual style,” writes Klein.

Now that’s really smart.
Post by: Ian Kerner Ph.D. – sex counselor

Penis Size: It May Be Written in the Length of His Fingers

Sexual Health

Penis Size: It May Be Written in the Length of His Fingers

2012-03-05

The ratio of the length of a man’s index finger to that of his ring finger may seem like a strange thing to measure, but new research suggests that it’s linked with penis size. The lower the ratio, the longer the penis.

The new study was conducted on 144 Korean men who were hospitalized for urological surgery. A researcher measured the patients’ penile length — flaccid and stretched — just after they went under anesthesia for their operations. A different researcher measured the men’s finger lengths, in order to prevent knowledge of one measurement unconsciously affecting the other.

They data suggested that those with a lower ratio, whose index finger (or second finger, 2D) was shorter than the ring finger (or fourth finger, 4D), had a longer stretched penis length, which is well correlated with erect size.

“Based on this evidence, we suggest that digit ratio can predict adult penile size,” the researchers, led by Dr. Tae Beom Kim of Gachon University in Incheon, Korea, wrote.

Previous studies have linked the so-called 2D:4D ratio of finger length with exposure to the sex hormones estrogen and testosterone in the womb. So it’s plausible that the same exposure may affect penis length.

Higher testosterone levels during fetal development are associated with a lower 2D:4D ratio, while higher estrogen levels are connected with a higher one. Most men have index fingers that are shorter (low ratio) than their ring fingers, while most women’s index fingers are the same size or longer (high ratio) than their ring fingers. Research has shown, however, that lesbians and female-to-male transgendered people are more likely to have more “male” ratios.

Finger-length ratios have been linked previously with a variety of other characteristics: in both males and females, lower ratios are associated with better athletic performance. In men, one study found that a lower ratio was connected with more success at high-frequency financial trading, while another study associated it with better performance on medical school entrance exams; women were not included in those studies.

Men with lower 2D:4D ratios were also more likely to have more “masculine” features, to have more symmetrical faces, and to be considered attractive by women, according to another study.

Yet other research links low 2D:4D ratios with higher rates of alcohol consumption and alcoholism itself. Some data suggest that a more “female” finger-length ratio in men is associated with increased risk for oral cancer but reduced risk for prostate cancer.

In both boys and girls, lower and more “male” 2D:4D ratios have also been repeatedly connected with autism; interestingly, a recent study also found that female-to-male transgendered people are more likely to have autistic traits.

MORE: Guys Are Right: Size Matters, When It Comes to Fertility

Of course, it remains to be seen whether the correlation between penis size and 2D:4D ratio holds true in non-Korean men or in Korean men who aren’t having some type of urological surgery.

But if so, digit ratio could be good for more than just a pick-up line at a bar. An easy and non-invasive measurement, it could give doctors a quick way to gauge how much testosterone their patients were exposed to in the womb, wrote Dr. Denise Brooks McQuade of Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., in an editorial accompanying the study.

The study was published in the Asian Journal of Andrology.

Maia Szalavitz is a health writer at TIME.com. Find her on Twitter at @maiasz. You can also continue the discussion on TIME Healthland’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIMEHealthland.

Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2011/07/06/penis-size-it-may-be-written-in-the-length-of-his-fingers/?iid=hl-article-mostpop1#ixzz1oFAyrVIy

Is your boss ruining your weekend?

Psycological Health

Is your boss ruining your weekend?

2012-02-28

Most Sundays last year, Juliet woke up feeling fine. But as the day wore on, she grew more agitated.

“By early afternoon I felt sick with stress and was walking around snapping at everyone. It was my husband who finally figured out that I was dreading going back to work Monday morning. The anticipation was ruining my Sundays.”

Juliet had loved her job until the company where she worked was bought out. The culture of the organization originally built and run by a handful of idealistic scientists shifted overnight.

“The scientists were out, and the incoming CEO and leadership team were these marketing types who set an entirely different tone. The new executives were like these funnels of stress, spreading anxiety throughout the organization.”

Continue reading Is your boss ruining your weekend? →

Are women turned off by stressed-out men?

Psycological Health

Are women turned off by stressed-out men?

2012-02-23

Scientists have been trying to confirm what Hollywood has known for decades: Women are often attracted to men with chiseled cheekbones and lantern jaws.

These and other masculine facial features are associated with high testosterone levels, and women seem to know this fact intuitively. Studies suggest that women are especially drawn to rugged-looking guys when they’re in the mood to mate (i.e., when they’re ovulating), while at other times, when they’re more interested in companionship, they tend to prefer a softer, more delicate look—think Ryan Gosling versus Burt Lancaster.

It’s not entirely clear why testosterone-fuelled features are attractive, but some experts have proposed that they’re a sign of a healthy immune system. Testosterone dampens immune function, so a man with high testosterone who’s still standing, the theory goes, is likely to have a stronger-than-average constitution. And he’ll pass those hardy genes on to his offspring, making him an attractive mate choice.

Continue reading Are women turned off by stressed-out men? →

Struggling with sex when you’re overweight

featured, Sexual Health

Struggling with sex when you’re overweight

2012-02-16

On the CBS sitcom “Mike & Molly,” the title characters meet at an Overeaters Anonymous support group and embark on a romantic relationship.

It’s an uncommon look at intimacy between plus-sized partners, played mainly for laughs. But with obesity rates skyrocketing in this country, sex when one or both partners is heavy is becoming a very real issue.

Nearly 34% of American adults are obese, according to the CDC, and many more are overweight. It’s not surprising that people who are carrying extra pounds may find themselves grappling with the effects on their sex lives.

Being overweight or obese can put a damper on things in the bedroom, as my clients Tom and Laura discovered. Married for 12 years, they had always enjoyed a satisfying sex life – until Laura began to gain weight. At first Tom was understanding: He knew that Laura’s self-esteem had taken a hit and he didn’t want to add to that.

Continue reading Struggling with sex when you’re overweight →

Does sex ed keep girls from becoming teen moms?

Reproductive Health

Does sex ed keep girls from becoming teen moms?

2012-02-14

In a new study, states with more comprehensive sex education programs had lower teen birth rates — but the effect seemed to be due more to political, religious and social differences between those states than the sex ed itself.

That doesn’t mean sex ed never helps prevent pregnancy, researchers said. But attitudes of family and friends, and whether teens have access to contraception and family planning services, might be just as important to putting a dent in the number of new teen moms.

“Although the teen birth rates and teen pregnancy rates are dropping year after year… we still have disparities between states, and we have higher teen birth and teen pregnancy rates when we’re compared to other industrialized countries,” said Patricia Cavazos-Rehg, from Washington University in St. Louis, who worked on the study.

Continue reading Does sex ed keep girls from becoming teen moms? →

Eczema tied to higher impotence risk

Sexual Health

Eczema tied to higher impotence risk

Men who have the allergic skin condition eczema may have a higher risk of erectile dysfunction than other men, a new study finds.

The study, of nearly 4,000 Taiwanese men with ED, hints at a connection between eczema and impotence.

And the researchers suggest that doctors “be more attentive to sexual complaints” from men with eczema — known medically as atopic dermatitis.

But an allergy expert not involved in the study said that while the findings are “interesting,” there are too many limitations to know whether eczema actually raises the risk of ED.

Continue reading Eczema tied to higher impotence risk →

Understanding females’ sexual fluidity

Sexual Health

Understanding females’ sexual fluidity

2012-02-10

Actress Cynthia Nixon made headlines recently when she said during an interview that she “chooses” to be a lesbian.

“I’ve been straight and I’ve been gay, and gay is better,” she said. “For me, it is a choice.”

As you might expect, her comments – published in a New York Times Magazine profile – set off a firestorm of controversy, with gay activists and others worrying that Nixon’s words would give credence to those who claim that being gay is a conscious decision, not a genetic certainty.

(She later clarified that she identifies most closely as a bisexual, which, she says, is a “fact,” not a choice.)

But, divisive wording aside, there may be something to Nixon’s remarks. The actress, who was once in a long-term relationship with a man and who is now engaged to a woman, appears to be an example of what scientists are now terming “sexual fluidity.” In other words, she may be attracted to a specific person rather than a particular gender.

It’s a phenomenon that Lisa Diamond, a University of Utah psychology professor, has studied extensively. In her 2008 book, “Sexual Fluidity: Understanding Women’s Love and Desire,” she writes that women’s sexuality appears to be much more fluid than men’s, and that this fluidity tends to involve three main characteristics:

– Non-exclusivity in attractions: can find either gender sexually attractive
– Changes in attractions: can suddenly find a man or woman sexually attractive after having been in a long-term relationship with the other
– Attraction to the person, not the gender

Research seems to support the idea that some women are able to move between relationships with both genders without blinking an eye – and that labels matter little. In a 2008 study, Diamond followed 70 lesbian, bisexual, and “unlabeled” women over the course of 10 years.

During that decade, two-thirds of the women changed their initial identity labels, and one-third of these changed labels at least twice. And although conventional wisdom suggests that more women would transition out of the bisexual and unlabeled groups and into the more “standard” groups of heterosexuality or homosexuality, this was not the case.

As Diamond writes, “More women adopted bisexual/unlabeled identities than relinquished these identities; few bisexual/unlabeled women ended up identifying as lesbian or heterosexual. Overall, the most commonly adopted identity was ‘unlabeled.’”

So is sexual fluidity unique to women? Possibly, says sexuality educator Emily Nagoski, author of the “Good in Bed Guide to Female Orgasms.”

“Making space for fluidity as a legitimate part of sexual orientation would help women, but it surely couldn’t hurt men. Men have some fluidity too, just not as much,” she writes. “It’s different for girls, this sexual orientation thing.”

She points to a variety of studies that help bolster this idea: For instance, research in men has found genetic differences that may be associated with homosexuality, but similar inheritability of sexual orientation has not yet been identified in women.

Plus, Nagoski adds, “Women’s experience of sexual orientation is more discontinuous and variable than men’s, which more typically emerges early and stays the same over different situations.” So, while most men tend to identify themselves as straight, gay, or bisexual relatively early in life, many women may have relationships with both men and women without choosing a specific sexual orientation.

Women may also be more receptive than men to a variety of sexual cues. For their recent book, “A Billion Wicked Thoughts,” neuroscientists Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam analyzed a billion web searches, a million websites, a million erotic videos, a million erotic stories, millions of personal ads and tens of thousands of digitized romance novels in order to better understand the sexual differences between men and women. They concluded that a single cue triggers arousal in the male brain, but that women’s brains require multiple cues to become aroused.

Similarly, research from the University of Toronto found that while men who identified themselves as heterosexual or homosexual became sexually aroused by straight or gay pornography, respectively, women were much more complicated: Regardless of their identified orientation, straight, gay, and bisexual women became physically aroused by a whole range of sexual imagery, including male–male, male–female, and female–female pornography. They were even turned on by images of mating monkeys, although they didn’t admit it.

Of course, we shouldn’t interpret these findings as proof that all heterosexual women are sexually attracted to other women, or to monkeys for that matter.

But they do suggest that women may be more capable of finding people and things attractive, no matter what orientation they claim. Perhaps that’s why an estimated 95% of straight men who fantasize about or partake in threesomes are only interested in being with two women, while more heterosexual women are open to adding another woman or man to the mix.

In the end, Cynthia Nixon’s comments and the conversation they’ve started may reveal less about the actress’s romantic leanings than our own preconceived notions about sexual orientation.

Maybe the lesson here is that love and lust are about people, not about labels – and I think that can only be a good thing.
Post by: Ian Kerner Ph.D. – sex counselor