And there was some exploration of the concept not new to me that arousal in women does not equal consent. I particularly recall a story about a woman who found herself unexpectedly in a sexual situation and was aroused but nonetheless did not want to go through with it. She extricated herself, and later the incident provided endless fantasy material. I also didn't know about Bremelanotide, a drug that appears to strongly stimulate sexual desire in women.
It failed FDA approval because of dangerous side effects, but the company is still working on it. The idea is to solve the problem of women who want to stay in their marriages but need their sexual mojo restored. And while such a drug could solve a lot of problems, even save a lot of marriages, it doesn't take much imagination to envision the problems it might create. This is an interesting book combining research on women's sexuality with anecdotes, many quite colorful.
Unfortunately, reading it is somewhat unsatisfying because so little is known about the sources of desire and many of the things we think we know are either probably or definitely wrong.
Apparently women's sexuality is not considered a worthy research topic at prestigious universities and many of the studies we have are flawed in some profound way. One example he gives is the belief that wome This is an interesting book combining research on women's sexuality with anecdotes, many quite colorful. One example he gives is the belief that women are pickier about partners based on analysis of speed dating events. In the usual format, the men rotated through the room while the women stayed put.
The men were interested in more second dates than the women were. Finally somebody thought to change the format, with the women rotating through the room. All of a sudden, the women were just as interested in second dates as the men were. Bergner claims that beliefs that women are more suited to monogamy than men are basically wishful thinking on the part of men. The saddest stories are about the waning of desire in long-term relationships, distressing both partners and often leading to breakups.
The holy grail for this research is to come up with the magic pill that brings back those old feelings. I loved this book. It was a very fast read, and I enjoyed hearing about the kind of work that is being done in exploring female sexuality.
It does a great job of tweezing out what we think we know about female sexuality and what can be proven, which is not a lot. The book raises a lot more questions about the topic than it answers, but the overall thrust of it is that much of what we as a society believe about female sexuality is BS. Comforting BS, but still BS. Perhaps it is confirmation bias o I loved this book. Perhaps it is confirmation bias on my part, but I'm so relieved to read a book that doesn't try to convince me of the same old crap about what I'm supposed to want.
That's a relief in itself. In some cases, erotic. Probably the best work of non-fiction I have read on female sexuality.
I take issue with the title however. It is really hard to take a book seriously when the title alludes to how difficult women are. Really, we aren't much different than men, except perhaps our sexuality is more repressed. Probably a good read for everyone - male and female alike.
Jun 11, E. Bergner's assimilation of current research on women's desire and libido is fascinating. When he sticks to cross-referencing the growing body of science he's giving readers unprecedented access to the seeds of another sexual revolution or the next phase of one, depending on your point of view. I was confused, however, by the repeated reference to the idea of "curing monogamy. Curing monogamy would mean the end of single pa Bergner's assimilation of current research on women's desire and libido is fascinating.
Curing monogamy would mean the end of single partner relationships, and that's not what this book is about at all. This book gets three stars because Bergner violates the inviolable in his third person narrative. He fictionalizes the thoughts and feelings of real people, which is more than distracting in a data-oriented book, and undercuts everything he presents.
The reader is left to wonder what other liberties he has taken in the information he's presenting. I expect not too many, but it's not a question you want your readers to ask. To Mr. Bergner and his editor I'd say only this: the book is great, but no more "she felt" "she trusted" or "she believed" only "she said she felt", "she said she trusted" and so on.
Good journalism is key, especially on groundbreaking subject matter for a historically maligned population. Anything less feels disrespectful. View all 5 comments. I picked this up after listening to a Savage Lovecast episode that features Bergner as a guest expert. He's an insightful researcher, and here he's put forth some fascinating information. But I can't quite recommend this book because the writing is really uneven.
Bergner's ideas are organized in a strange and jumbled fashion. Also Bergner relays his interviewees' personal stories in a strangely lurid and melodramatic way. The tale about the basketball coach's wife in particular just seemed rambling and unnecessary. One last complaint, I understood what Bergner's was driving at - this idea that long term monogamy and stability unfortunately marks the end of many women's sexual desire, and it's a valid point.
But the second half of the book is pretty depressing, he hammers on it a bit too hard without providing an alternative viewpoint.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, why do these types of books never speak to practicing nonmonogamists? View all 7 comments.
I started this book with high hopes, after all what male doesn't want to learn this age old secret? After finishing this book I largely felt a gag book titled, "What Men Know About Women," that consisted entirely of some blank pages was nearly as informative. The big difference between the two books was that Bergner also discovers that women also really don't know much about what they want either.
So it seems we are clueless in this together, the status quo is safe. The problem seems to be th I started this book with high hopes, after all what male doesn't want to learn this age old secret? The problem seems to be that women are either unaware of or ashamed to admit what it is they do desire. The case is equally strong for both conditions and is probably a mixture.
There is no doubt that society and cultures around the world have heavily suppressed female sexuality and thus we have few none? This book and other more recent research however does suggest our existing models are very wrong. Women are not any less likely to appreciate variety or frequency than men.
Very telling is the numbers of affair site Ashley Madison. For most of the history of this site and others like it, it's primary been what could be termed a sausage fest- a lot more guys than women. However recently for the crowd 35 years and under we are seeing equality in numbers for the first time. A combination of technology and financial resources seems to be allowing women the same opportunities for play in foreign fields that has been traditionally reserved for men.
Hardly a trend that supports the theory of women being primarily concerned with nurturing relationships and life long companionship. I think the strongest parts of this book was when the search for a female Viagra was explored. The early concerns about being to successful and having society thrown into chaos as waves of women under chemical influence lose their inhibitions- it's going to remain a dream or at best a very popular fiction book.
It turns out big surprise that just increasing blood flow in a woman's nether regions is not enough. The missing ingredient that remains beyond the reach of any chemist is desire, the desire of a narcissist. It appears that a key element of sexual satisfaction and desire for women is being desired. It appears that women while appreciating faithful men also find having a captive man as exciting as a canned hunt put the gun between the bars and shoot.
A man who only has one choice to make is hardly acting out of desire for a specific subject. It seems that a woman would rather be the one chosen from many than being the sole competitor unless of course she was runner up.
This plays into the supposedly common and popular rape fantasy that nearly all women have. Before anyone gets the wrong idea, it's not that women want to be raped. Rather there are elements that are linked to desire. Someone wanting them, them alone, the want overcoming one of societies strongest forbidden actions, and the notion of being irresistible.
While for sure not the scene of a real rape it's not the scene played out in many safe regular encounters either. I was sent a video that I think wraps this topic up quite nicely. Long Term Relationships and Desire I read the author's New York Times Magazine piece based on this work, and decided to go for the book. Daniel Bergner talks to researchers, mostly women, who are empirically investigating female desire, and describes specific findings, as well as patterns emerging in the growing literature.
Along the way, much of what our culture likes to believe about female sexuality, and well as what many of the research subjects wanted to believe about themselves, is called seriously into question on increasi I read the author's New York Times Magazine piece based on this work, and decided to go for the book.
Along the way, much of what our culture likes to believe about female sexuality, and well as what many of the research subjects wanted to believe about themselves, is called seriously into question on increasingly firm scientific ground. Evolutionary psychology, on the basis of what it considers to be adaptive, has posited that women, having more limited opportunity to bequeath their genes, and needing support in child-rearing, will tend to be inclined more toward monogamy, tend to fewer sexual partners, and in general, express these tendencies through greater sexual restraint than men.
Men--at least in terms of spreading their genes--supposedly benefit from casting their copiously produced genetic material through as many females as possible.
This is a somewhat simplistic summary, since difficult-to-explain cracks in it appear both in human and animal studies. I find evolutionary psychology fascinating, but its theories are often very hard to validate empirically, or to falsify. And the women in the studies cited in What Do Women Want?
At the same time, the women reported their levels of arousal while looking at these erotic videos, photographs, and in some cases, listening to stories. Members of one group, as a form of control, were attached to a device they were told was a lie detector.
Women without the "lie detector" reported low levels of arousal in many cases when the physiological measurements said otherwise. The women in the lie-detector group had self-reported levels of arousal much closer than those who did not believe they were being monitored. Other researchers are looking at what to do about women who have lost desire for their partners in long-term relationships.
These women love their husbands or partners, and want to maintain the close bonds. Part of the book looks at pharmaceutical efforts to deal with this. But in the course of talking with women whose desire for their partners has waned, researchers have learned that fantasies of other partners still appeal to the women, and that the women, at least in their expressed wishes, appear no more monogamous by nature than men are typically thought to be.
Fantasies that push boundaries and alarm feminists are more common, at least at this point in the field's development, than would commonly be thought. One might say that eating and having sex are the two activities most basic to life, all life, including humans. Eating sustains individuals, and sex sustains the species.
No getting around that. But we do need some controls on both, and people have adapted to the need for controlling sexual expression in myriad ways, as any good historical or cross-cultural look at the topic can attest.
But could we get along better if we were more conscious of what we're doing? Really quite disappointing. It's as though the book was written at four or more different stages in the writer's life - or even, by four or more different people - and the results were just lumped together in a nonsensical blob. It starts out with an oh-so "American" bit of pseudo-journalism, full of soft porn innuendo "Her legs were long, her breasts, full, high..
It moves effortlessly on to an account of how the female of quite a number of species is in fact the sexual protagonist - but witho Really quite disappointing. It moves effortlessly on to an account of how the female of quite a number of species is in fact the sexual protagonist - but without really attaching this idea to homo sapiens. It makes a passing, almost sneering, reference to the tension between nature and nurture in defining what drives women - but makes no attempt of any kind to apply it.
It slips into full-on pseudo-intellectual burble a typical example - "a wealth of pop psychology writing declares confidently that there is an all-determining link between inborn levels of testosterone and myriad forms of aggression or passivity - sexual forms high kong them - in men and women". Yeah right. And finally, in direct contradiction of the initial "women are horny" section, it closes with a semi-exploration of the idea that many women lose their sex drives altogether - and how this represents a great opportunity for someone to come up with a female Viagra.
I read this book as I was - am - truly interested to learn more on this strangely obscure subject. I finished it none the wiser. A potentially interesting book marred in part by the journalistic style. I know that's unfair, but I wanted less of the human interest and more about the science. That being said, a lot of the studies talked about in the book have been out for quite a while, and the book doesn't add anything to them, despite its supposedly considerable interviews.
There is nothing new here. I also began to wonder whether it was strictly necessary to describe each scientist and her fashion every time the author g A potentially interesting book marred in part by the journalistic style. I also began to wonder whether it was strictly necessary to describe each scientist and her fashion every time the author goes to talk about a new area of research he doesn't do it for the men.
I realise this is journalistic style, but it really takes away from the whole point of the book, which is that our current understanding of female sexuality is completely socially constructed [by men]. It's not massively problematic, but it does grate and somewhat undermine the book as a whole.
Interesting, I suppose, if you don't keep up with sexology and so on, but largely reiterative. Naomi Wolf's book Vagina, though problematic in its own ways, is a far more interesting exploration of the topic. It is an interesting topic but I am not sure what to take from reading the book. Which is why, perhaps, overt sexuality in women over child-bearing age, or 35 in Hollywood, is not considered attractive, while Robert Redford can still play a romantic lead.
Bergner is good on this, the politically motivated promotion of some scientific theories over others. Parental investment theory is the strand of evolutionary psychology that argues women are inclined towards monogamy and "safe sex" for the protection of their children, while men, for equally good evolutionary reasons, are compelled to scatter their seed far and wide. But, Bergner writes, other studies undermine this completely, showing that in feral environments where male monkeys randomly kill babies in the group, a female monkey who has sex with as many males as possible obscures paternity of her child and stands a better chance of every male in the group protecting it.
Or, in certain monkey societies, the female is dominant, a sexual aggressor who instigates sex and appears to want more of it than male monkeys.
The causation in these examples can sometimes feel a bit flippant, particularly when it comes to rat motivation: a female rat who runs away from her partner is said to do so in order that "the sex didn't end too quickly for her".
Women readers could write in with alternative explanations. And the potted social histories are cursory — from Freud to Madonna in a single sentence, and a summary of Victorian "nascent feminism" that aligns it with Christian evangelism to explain how women came to be seen as society's moral guardians. Without wider social or political context this is practically meaningless. Trade Paperback eBook. Table of Contents Rave and Reviews.
About The Book. About The Author. Wyatt Kounts. Paco Underhill. Product Details. Raves and Reviews. But at least we no longer describe sexually active women as nymphomanics , and treat them with clitoredectomy, borax in the vagina, or freezing cold baths as was done in the 19th century.
But this is not to empower women in their sexuality. It is to medicate the millions who report sexual disinterest or lack of pleasure in long-term relationships. Or that many adult women would rather have a cup of tea than have sex with their long-term partner. The celebration of the sexually active younger woman through raunch culture may appear to contradict this trend. But the statistics tell their own tale. Women with a new lover were most likely to enjoy sex.
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