New research suggests the importance of several factors that contribute to the sexual satisfaction of women vary based on sexual orientation. The findings, published in The Journal of Sex Research, highlights the need to consider sexual identity when researching sexual satisfaction.
“Sexual satisfaction is such a vital part of individual and relationship health, but the research and clinical attention given to the topic does not match this importance. It seems like it’s viewed as an ‘extra’ part of life, something that’s nice to have but not regarded as an essential part of human existence,” said researcher Laura Holt, a psychologist and outreach coordinator for University of Missouri at St. Louis.
“When I started researching the topic to try to learn more about sexual satisfaction for women, I realized that not only is it under-researched, but the way research has been done has been messy and focused on heterosexual people. Most of the researchers didn’t explain to participants or readers what exactly they meant by ‘sexual satisfaction,’ and some of them boiled it down to whether or not participants had an orgasm, which leaves out the folks who are anorgasmic but still sexually satisfied.”
“I also noticed a lot of assumptions in measures, taking it for granted that people of different sexual identities and genders experience their sexual satisfaction the same way, so it was thought measures of sexual satisfaction developed for men and/or straight people would work for everyone. I wanted to explore that and see if those assumptions were accurate,” Holt explained.
To better understand sexual satisfaction among women with varying sexual identities, the researchers had 996 heterosexual women, 333 bisexual women, and 204 lesbian women complete a battery of surveys. The participants responded to the question “How sexually satisfied are you?” on a 7-point scale and then provided a written explanation of their choice. They also completed the 25-item Potential Sexual Satisfaction Factors survey and the 20-item New Sexual Satisfaction Scale.
“Sexual satisfaction is generally important, and different people need different experiences to feel satisfied. This is largely a study designed to improve clinical and research measures of sexual satisfaction, so if you’re looking for one Stulhofer et al’s New Sexual Satisfaction Scale is a pretty good one,” Holt told PsyPost.
The researchers found that scores on the New Sexual Satisfaction Scale were strongly correlated with responses to the generic question about sexual satisfaction for heterosexual, bisexual, and lesbian women. The scale also showed a high degree of internal consistency. Scores on measures of sexual satisfaction were similar among women of differing sexual identities.
But Holt and her colleagues also uncovered several factors that contributed to sexual satisfaction that varied based on sexual orientation. For example, heterosexual women placed greater importance on how often they have an orgasm.
“This study makes it clear that the idea of sexual satisfaction as we think about it is often heteronormative; this study revealed differences in the sexual satisfaction among straight, bisexual, and lesbian women in the areas of the importance placed on sexual activity, use of sex materials, frequency of physical intimacy/sexual activity NOT including intercourse, how often the person has an orgasm, her perception of her relationship’s strength and longevity, her feeling that her sexual activity is morally correct and/or fits her religious beliefs, her feelings of acceptance and comfort with her sexual identity, her masturbatory activities/solo sex, her experiences with partners in addition to her primary partner, how often her partner and she talk about both sex and topics other than sex,” Holt explained.
“The study also revealed some measure items that may be related to bisexual and lesbian women’s sexual satisfaction, including desire; how she feels anticipating, during, and after sex; physical capability for sex; chemistry/sexual affinity factors unique to her partner; duration of sex acts; and sexual self-confidence. These ideas are important because bisexual and lesbian women hearing or reading about straight women’s sexual satisfaction may feel increased internalized homophobia (which decreases sexual satisfaction) if they’re expecting their own sexual satisfaction factors to match the straight women’s, which can result increased shame if they don’t.”
“The factor that united all participants regardless of sexual identity was frequency of sexual activity; it was mentioned most for all three groups of women,” Holt noted.
But the study — like all research — includes some limitations.
“In order to narrowly answer questions about sexual satisfaction for bisexual and lesbian women, we had to eliminate variables like biological sex and relationship forms. So it’s possible that trans and/or poly people may have different needs for sexual satisfaction,” Holt explained. “Just as we don’t assume cisgender heterosexual men’s sexual satisfaction can be mapped onto women, we should be careful making similar assumptions for other groups. More research is needed!”
“There are so many different ways to have sex that feels satisfying to you, don’t let the most common ideas about straight sex influence you or make you feel as if what you need to have great sex is not perfectly fine,” she added.
The study, “Female Sexual Satisfaction and Sexual Identity“, was authored by Laura L. Holt , Y. Barry Chung , Erick Janssen, and Zoë D. Peterson.
