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She Had Sex for the Sake of Science

By Sally Chew | April 18, 2008


To research her new book, Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex, Mary Roach is happy to reveal that she had sex in 4-D ultrasound and personally sampled a vaginal photoplethysmography probe, among other cool stuff. Nice for her, but what about the rest of us? It’s the 10th anniversary of Viagra, after all, and for women the sexual-dysfunction cupboard is still bare!

The bumbling search for solutions to low libido and inorgasmia is kind of interesting to read about, though, and not just because Roach is so hands-on in her inquiry, but because you also learn a few fundamental things about women. For example, women are easier to please than men in our choices of pornography, but much harder to help, physiologically, with our sex problems. Give a woman a Cialis or a Viagra and the needle on the vaginal-blood-flow monitor registers “yes!” but the woman doesn’t feel a thing.

Now let me share too much information, Mary Roach-style, by saying that while having sex this weekend, an image of that bizarro 4-D ultrasound video popped into my head. And it turns out simply being able to think about that video—or anything other than sex—during sex gives my gender away. One of the book’s best quotes comes from a researcher who reports that "Cheese crumbs spread in front of a copulating pair of rats may distract the female, but not the male."


Comments (9)

The following content represents the opinions of Health.com users. It is not editorially reviewed for medical or factual accuracy. It does not constitute medical advice. See your doctor for medical advice.
  • If you look closely you can see the Buddha at the top.

  • Tony Tobius

    The conclusions you’ve jumped to based on a study of rats and your own personal experience reveals much more about your personal cognitive limitations than they do about gender differences in human cognition during intercourse.

    For example, thinking about something else during intercourse is a classic way for men to delay orgasm. Perhaps you should spend more time thinking about the implications of that for female orgasm difficulties, than drawing sweeping and incorrect conclusions about an entire gender.

  • Jo

    I totally agree with Tony. Lady, you’re a moron. Take a science class, then quit writing “scientific articles”.

  • Ron

    Maybe you guys should try reading the book.

  • Able to think

    I agree with Jo and Ron. That’s kind of a ridiculous conclusion, especially coming from a woman. What would she know about being a guy and having intercourse?
    It’s way to easy to get distracted and end up disappointing. Sometimes it takes a lot of work on the womans’s part to help keep concentration up.

  • Marty

    Really, because I am a guy and have found myself completely distracted during sex a lot of times. Thinking about things I have to do later, strange noises in the house, trips I had taken as a child, and yes, even crumbs on the bed have all caused me to be distracted during sex - and I have had a LOT of sex.

  • sound crazy but for her work its worth the course. But i guess she 2 much far for her so called research

  • Squirrel

    Is it my imagination, or does the image above show buttsecks?

  • I’d like to know how this lady looks so we need more pictures

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