Determinants of subjective experience of sexual arousal in women: Feedback from genital arousal and erotic stimulus content

TLDR

The study investigates how genital arousal relates to subjective sexual arousal in women. Sixty‑two women underwent four stimulus conditions that varied genital arousal patterns over time, with repeated trials and self‑reported genital sensations. Genital and subjective arousal were linearly related only when genital arousal varied across trials, and when genital arousal remained constant the relationship disappeared, indicating that peripheral feedback is a relatively unimportant determinant of subjective arousal.

Abstract

Abstract Sixty‐two women participated in a study designed to explore the association between gental and subjective sexual arousal. Four stimulus conditions were created, designed to evoke differential patterns of genital arousal over time. Subjects were instructed to report sensations in their genitalia while being exposed to the same erotic stimulus on repeated trials or to a series of varying erotic stimuli. Detection of genital arousal was facilitated by the occurrence of changes in genital arousal over trials. That is, genital and subjective sexual arousal were linearly related in conditions that resulted in large differences in genital arousal over trails, whereas such a relation was absent in conditions in which genital arousal levels remained relatively constant. In women, peripheral feedback from consciously detected genital arousal seems to be a relatively unimportant determinant of subjective sexual arousal.