Rejoice, women of the internet! There is a study out there to help YOU achieve decent orgasms — at last.
Breaking it down for ya:
Look, it’s very difficult to guide your sexual partner if you aren’t sure what exactly it is that gives you pleasure. So a team of scientists asked thousands of women to describe what increases satisfaction, created words for the more common answers, and hope that they can give people the words they need to get what they need.
Dr. Devon Hensel of the University of Indiana worked with English speaking women all over the world.
She then gave the techniques these women described names.
To make sure they were getting the sexual acts correct, the women were also shown videos of other women explaining the acts as well.
The most popular of the sexual acts? “Angling” — adjusting the hips. More than 87% of the survey’s responders said it increased pleasure.
Also high on the list? Rocking, shallowing, and pairing.
Rocking is when the penis, finger, or toy remains inside and the woman rocks against it, keeping the clitoris “in constant contact.” Shallowing is “touch that stays just inside the entrance of the vagina.” Pairing is when, during penetration, the clitoris is also stimulated.
The PLOS paper also writes about the “subforms”, or more specific versions, of each of these main methods.
The women who participated in the study also reported what kind of pleasure they received.
For example, ten percent of women who enjoyed shallowing said it raised the possibility of having an orgasm and 25% said it created stronger orgasms.
While Devon and co-authors may not need to justify studying sexual pleasure, they do so. They explain that good sexual encounters are associated with “physical, social and emotional well-being…and lower levels of depression, stress and anxiety.”
“Sexual pleasure research can support person-centered perspectives by assessing granularity of what makes sex enjoyable for each [woman], rather than making the assumption that the same handful of approaches work equally well for all women.”
Most research, they explain, is focused “on he body part or object that stimulates or penetrates the vagina.” This ignores how women bring themselves to climax. Hensel also used a much more diverse, and larger, sample than previous studies of female sexuality.
Without legitimate scientific research, women have had to figure out what they like on their own and figure out how to communicate it. This may lead them to resources like magazines, which may focus on methods that aren’t great for everyone.