The Role of Intimate Connection in Great Sex
There’s a lot more to great sex than just the mechanics
The orgasm gap is the difference in how often women have orgasms during sexual intercourse compared to men. While some studies show that roughly 75% of men are capable of climaxing every time they have sex, only 33% of women can reach orgasm every time.
Traditionally, we believed that the main reason for this was that most women require clitoral stimulation to achieve an orgasm. Explanations have ranged from a simple lack of education to lazy male partners who wouldn’t go the extra mile to satisfy their partners in bed.
One solution dreamt up in the olden days was to extend the duration of sex and include clitoral stimulation. Open and shut case, right?
Well, not quite…
Digging into the science a bit, we find out that the truth is a lot messier than our armchair mechanical explanations about the orgasm gap suppose.
What I’m about to tell you is going to flip all of those old, dusty ideas on their heads, supplanting them with something far less tangible, but far more poetic, human, and dare I say, romantic.
Defining the Gap: a Hypothesis
In a study called Differences in Orgasm Frequency Among Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Heterosexual Men and Women in a U.S. National Sample found that the rates of usually always reaching climax during sex were as follows:
Heterosexual men: 95%
Homosexual men: 89%
Bisexual men: 88%
Lesbian women: 86%
Bisexual women: 66%
Heterosexual women: 65%
This study included 52,588 total participants. Judging by these averages, it seems that part of the problem is the magic, tragic combination of heterosexual men and women having sex together.
Did You Finnish? Orgasms & Gaps in Finland.
A study conducted in Finland titled Determinants of female sexual orgasms sought to explore the causes — mechanical, sexual, emotional, you name it — of the orgasm gap. Specifically, they wanted to understand what variables determined success or failure when it comes to women having orgasms.
Important to note, Finland is one of the most equal countries in the world when it comes to equality between the sexes.
Researchers gathered data from five national sex surveys, called FINSEX and ORGSEX, across a span of 43 years, between 1971 and 2015, covering several generations and including participants between18 to 81 years old.
In all, 10,637 respondents, 4,482 men, and 6,155 women were included in the results.
This was a massive sex study.
The FINSEX survey had more than 100 questions bracketed into sections that grouped them accordingly. These weren’t simple five-question multiple-choice surveys — they were thorough and detailed.
The ORGSEX survey asked a bit about the background of the participants, but mostly centered around how often they orgasmed — and from what.
What the researchers expected to find was those who extended the duration of their sexcapades while implementing more clitoral action, saw an increase in the number of orgasms for the women involved.
They were surprised when the results did not show that.
And experimenting with different partners in open relationships didn’t solve the problem either. As the study authors note:
Contrary to expectations, women did not have orgasms that are more frequent by increasing their experience and practice of masturbation, or by experimenting with different partners in their lifetime.
But what they did find was really curious. It was one of those findings that you read about and think, “Why didn’t I think of that this whole time?”
And it all boiled down to intangible things like self-confidence and relationships satisfaction. As the study authors tell us:
The keys to their more frequent orgasms lay in mental and relationship factors. These factors and capacities included orgasm importance, sexual desire, sexual self-esteem, and openness of sexual communication with partners. Women valued their partner’s orgasm more than their own. In addition, positive determinants were the ability to concentrate, mutual sexual initiations, and partner’s good sexual techniques. A relationship that felt good and worked well emotionally, and where sex was approached openly and appreciatively, promoted orgasms.
Sexual communication, relationships that feel good and work well emotionally, and an open and non-judgmental atmosphere that promotes orgasms? How did no one think of this before?
Leave it to us to try to find a mechanical explanation instead of questioning the most basic thing of all — is her relationship going okay?
Prioritizing Orgasms
Here’s where things get really bizarre. In another “I should’ve thought of that” moment, researchers found that the women who placed greater importance on having an orgasm had more orgasms.
Contrary to popular belief that says if you try too hard, you’ll just ruin the experience, there was a clear pattern suggesting that couples who prioritized orgasms experienced more of them.
Other results, like masturbation history and habits, didn’t show this kind of clear difference. We don’t see a lot of variance around women’s masturbation habits and orgasms during sex.
Even the type of stimulation involved didn’t make as much of a difference as prioritizing orgasm did. This is totally out of left field and contrary to popular belief.
Yes, even the method of achieving orgasm didn’t have as much of an effect on the total number of orgasms had as prioritizing her orgasm. What can we take away from this?
Takeaways
A couple of things can be interpreted from these data. First, as I mentioned in my other recent article on the orgasm gap, we have a chicken-and-the-egg problem. Which came first, the prioritizing of the orgasm or the connection between the two partners?
As mentioned above, atmospherics had a lot to do with it, things like sexual openness, a willingness by both partners to prioritize orgasm, mutual sexual initiations, and good techniques; but prioritizing orgasm was the number one factor influencing whether the orgasm gap remained open or finally closed.
Connection is that magical, intangible thing that can help close the orgasm gap, and prioritizing orgasm is the mechanism by which that happens.
The best lovers out there are the ones who are open, flexible, and receptive to their partner’s thoughts, feelings, opinions, and desires. Not only are they willing to try new things, but they’re willing to take the initiative and dream up new and fun ideas, no matter how “vanilla” they may seem, to keep things fresh and interesting.
As such, their sex lives are practically never straight-to-penetration sex without side excursions of various sorts, be they back massages, sweet emails, open and non-judgmental conversations about sex, or various activities like oral and anal sex.
Speaking of which, I think that should be the subject for my next article.
What does anal sex tell us about the orgasm gap?
Find out here.
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Three books I recommend checking out:
Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships
A Billion Wicked Thoughts: What the Internet Tells Us About Sexual Relationships
The Myth of Monogamy: Fidelity and Infidelity in Animals and People
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