A woman’s ability to have an orgasm is at least partly determined by her genes and can’t be blamed entirely on cultural influences, new research suggests.
Experts say that’s likely to be interpreted as both good and bad news.
“It’ll be upsetting because some women will think, ‘Oh my God, maybe I just can’t.’ On the other hand it takes away a kind of guilt or pressure,” said Dr. Virginia Sadock, director of the human sexuality program at NYU Medical Center.
In the study, reported this week in Biology Letters, scientists from St. Thomas’ Hospital in London sent questionnaires to 4,037 women. About half were identical twins, and half were non-identical twins.
One in three reported never or hardly ever reaching orgasm during intercourse, and 21 percent said they hardly, if ever, achieve climax during masturbation. Those figures are consistent with other surveys conducted over the last few decades.
However, the questionnaires revealed a significant genetic influence on the ability to reach orgasm, said lead researcher Tim Spector, a genetic epidemiologist.
The similarity was greater in identical twins than it was in non-identical twins, Spector said. Because the only difference between the two groups was genetic, the researchers concluded that the gap between the groups was the genetic component.
The idea that orgasm ability has a genetic component makes sense, said female orgasm expert Laura Berman, a professor at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in Evanston.
“A lot of the women that I treat will tell me that when they talk to their siblings or mothers, they very often have similar challenges,” said Berman, who was not involved with the study. “One could make the case that it’s nurture, not nature, because these twins were brought up together, but you can’t rule out the genetic argument.”
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Compiled from news services and edited by Patrick Olsen (polsen@tribune.com) and Scott Kleinberg (skleinberg@tribune.com)
