Scientific research with a sex hook always makes me wary. Partly because I’m a frustrated sex research geek and partly because I know there is a whole mess o’ things that the cheeky journalists aren’t reporting. The recent spate of postings about the research tying sexual intercourse to reduced stress levels, is a good case in point.
As reported , this study, conducted by Prof. Stuart Brody (who has authored several studies specifically examining the benefits of penile-vaginal intercourse) showed that people who had penile-vaginal intercourse (as opposed to masturbation or other vaginal intercourse behaviors) scored lower blood pressure values in a stressful situation.
Sounds interesting. But my curiosity was obviously peaked by the narrow focus on penile vaginal intercourse. Why differentiate it from other forms of penetration play (solo or partnered)?
Reading the full study (which will cost you $30 if you don’t have some sort of library privileges) answers these questions in short order.
The author begins by using a combination of physiological, evolutionary, and Freudian citations to argue why penile-vaginal intercourse could confers special health benefits over masturbation and other partnered sexual behaviors. Mind you there is no discussion of what “other sexual behaviors” actually means, or what sort of masturbation we’re talking about.
Using an evolutionary argument to explain individual sexual behaviors is a bit like shooting fish in a barrel (or maybe it’s like a snake consuming its own tail, I can’t figure out which). The point is that one can make almost any argument and tie it to adaptive reasoning.
Using Freud’s theory of psycho-sexual development is another story. The author cites Freud who argued that penile-vaginal intercourse was the end result of health psychosexual development. If someone became arrested at an earlier stage, they might be more likely to engage in less “successful” sexual behaviors, including masturbation, which don’t confer the same “disburdening” function as mature penile-vaginal intercourse. The author uses this argument to bolster the notion that penile-vaginal intercourse has more health benefits than other forms of sexual behavior.
Now, I love Freud as much as the next former-psych-student-who-had-a-crush-on-his- Freudian-thesis-supervisor. But citing Freud in a biological paper about sexual functioning is specious at best. Next thing you know, he’s going to be suggesting that clitoral orgasms are “immature” and vaginal ones are “mature”. And this is precisely what he does.
The holes in this approach are many. Here are a few obvious problems.
