The Female Sexual Response Cycle: Yes, It's Complicated

How do women get and stay turned on? What enables us to enjoy sex and maybe even have an orgasm? And why do we want to have sex in the first place? These are questions that sex researchers have been wrestling with since the 1960s.

As studies involving thousands of subjects slowly revealed common patterns, researchers began piecing together a model of the 'sexual response cycle.' What started as a linear process with just 3 or 4 phases has since evolved into something fascinatingly complex.

At Origin, we're particularly interested in the sexual response cycle for patients who have chronic pain with sex. Healing from chronic pain is a nuanced process, and even more so when sex is involved. You're not just navigating pelvic pain triggers and responses, you're also responding to a host of factors that impact how you experience sex.

The more we know about the forces at play during sex, the more empowered we are to make positive choices and changes. So let's get into the female sexual response cycle and what it can teach us.

A Brief History of the Female Sexual Response Cycle

The first model of the sexual response cycle was developed by the groundbreaking sex researchers William Masters and Virginia Johnson in the 1960s, and applied to both men and women. Their "cycle" included four linear stages that focused only on changes that they could see and objectively measure: excitement (initial physical arousal), plateau (intensified arousal), orgasm (the physical release of sexual tension), and resolution (return to baseline).

In the years that followed, researchers including renowned sex expert Helen Singer Kaplan upgraded Masters and Johnson's model into a four-stage cycle that introduced the mental desire for sex as a precursor to physical arousal. This was a critical step in recognizing the impact of thoughts and emotions on physical sexual response.

These days, sexual health researchers have confirmed what most women intuitively know: getting and staying turned on is nowhere near as simple or one-way as this model suggests.

The New Female Sexual Response Cycle

A new model of the female sexual response cycle was created by Rosemary Basson, PhD in the early 2000s. This model — which is truly cyclical — helps normalize the many factors that can impact a woman's desire for sex and ability to get physically aroused. It also moves away from orgasm as a set endpoint and main indicator of whether or not sex is satisfying.

While it's a huge improvement on the previous model, it's far from a complete picture. For one, the term "female" in the vast majority of studies on sexual response refers only to people with vaginal anatomy who identify as women and have sex with men. And very few studies have been done to explore potential differences in sexual desire among queer and non-gender conforming individuals. Still, every step forward is a step in the right direction.

Origin's illustrated version of Basson's diagram, shown below, incorporates examples of negative and positive factors that can contribute to or detract from sexual arousal.

A Closer Look at the New Female Sexual Response Cycle

Since the new model of female sexual response is a little more complicated than 1-2-3-4, it merits a detailed explanation. Feeling both ‘in the mood’ and willing to have sex involves an interplay between all of the following factors:

Sexual Motivation

Sexual motivation is what drives your desire to have a sexual encounter in the first place. What are you hoping to “gain”? This can be sexual in nature (i.e. you want to feel good), but can also be non-sexual such as a desire to feel close or intimate with your partner, or maybe you just want to ease stress or fall asleep faster. Including sexual motivation to the arousal cycle helps recognize that women have sex for many reasons other than the desire to have an orgasm.

When sex is painful (aka dyspareunia) or you have difficulties with arousal or orgasm, it's typical to feel much less sexual motivation. What you'd stand to gain may not seem worth the pain and discomfort.

Sexual Receptivity

Sexual receptivity is about how open you feel to having a sexual or intimate experience when given the opportunity. Note that the looping nature of this model reflects that you can be receptive to intimacy and/or sex before or after becoming aroused.

Stimuli with Context

The upshot of "stimuli with context" is that whether something turns you on depends very much on the situation in which you're experiencing it. For partnered sex, some of the context can include who is involved, as well as their motivation and receptivity. It can also depend on factors such as how much sleep you had the night before, how stressed you are, and whether or not you and your partner have been getting along.

Of all the factors in the cycle, this one can be the hardest to unpack. You may not even be conscious of why something that turned you on two nights ago isn't doing the trick this time around.

Arousability

Arousability refers to whether or not your body changes in response to sexual desire and activity. Here’s a simplified run down of what happens when you’re aroused and everything is working as it should:

• The vagina lengthens and opens
• The inner labia swell and fold outward
• Blood fuels the nerves connected to the genitals
• Lubricant from glands near the vaginal entrance as well as the cervix and vaginal wall starts flowing
• Erectile tissue in the clitoris becomes engorged

If any of the changes above aren't happening as expected, it may be due to sexual dysfunction.

Responsive Desire

Responsive desire is desire that starts or increases with sexual activity. For example, if you were feeling neutral (but still receptive) before sexual activity started, but you're getting more and more into it as things progress, that's responsive desire.

Satisfaction

When all is said and done, how positive do you feel about the sexual encounter? The more satisfied you feel after a sexual experience, the more likely you’ll be motivated to experience it again.

And Introducing the Wildcard: Spontaneous Sexual Desire

One more important factor that isn't included in the illustration above but can supercharge female sexual response is spontaneous sexual desire — that urgency and passion that can seem to come out of nowhere. Spontaneous desire can feed into your motivation to have sex, your response to sexual stimuli, and your mental and physical arousal.

Unlocking Your Best Sex Life

If your current desire for sex and ability to get aroused, have an orgasm, or enjoy pain-free sex isn't where you want it to be, you can change that.

Working with a medical team that includes a gynecologist, a sexual therapist, and/or a pelvic floor physical therapist is often the best way to significantly improve your sex life. At Origin, we help women and people with vaginal anatomy address sexual dysfunction and boost their sexual satisfaction every day.

Don't hesitate to book a visit and we'll help you get all the care you need.