What makes her want you?

The first validated measure for assessing cues associated with sexual desire in females has been developed by researchers at the University of Texas, Austin. This tool could be beneficial for use in therapy for women diagnosed with hypoactive sexual desire disorder, or loss of sexual desire, which is the leading sexual problem among females in the world today.

An initial group of women (ages 18-67) were asked to provide as many answers as possible to the question, "What makes you desire sexual activity?"--defined as kissing, petting, oral sex, intercourse, and masturbation. The responses generated a list of 125 items, including talking about the future with your partner; watching a strip tease; having a sexual fantasy; your partner does special or loving things for you; conversing with someone wealthy; seeing a well-toned body; watching a sunset; and laughing with a romantic partner.

The initial list of 125 prompts then was administered to a community sample of women of similar age. Responses from these participants were used to produce a final 40-item "Cues for Sexual Desire Scale" (CSDS). The findings support the idea that there are different clusters of cues for sexual desire existing for women. These clusters were identified as emotional bonding; erotic/explicit; visual/proximity; and implicit/romantic. The CSDS then was administered to a clinical age-matched sample of women. Here, data shows that, in women without sexual desire concerns, the most commonly selected cue about what makes them desire sexual activity for each of the clusters, respectively, was experiencing emotional closeness; asking for or anticipating sexual activity; seeing or talking with someone who is intelligent; and giving or receiving a massage.

"Given that low sexual desire is the most common sexual problem among women in the U.S., the aim of our study was to develop an objective measure that identifies differences in cues which trigger feelings of sexual desire in women," states lead researcher Katie M. McCall.

Additional statistical analyses for collecting information regarding current sexual activity and demographics reveal that, compared to women who do not have sexual desire concerns, those with them report significantly fewer cues resulting in wanting to have sex. "This study helped us better understand and classify the many varied and complex factors that trigger feelings of sexual desire in women," adds Cindy Meston, head of the Female Sexual Psychophysiology Lab and study co-author. "It is our hope these findings will help clinicians who are working with women with clinically low levels of sexual desire to explore potentially new areas for improving their clients' sexual pleasure."

"Current strategies for therapists treating hypoactive sexual desire disorder are primarily based on subjective information," explains Irwin Goldstein, editor-in-chief of The Journal of Sexual Medicine. "This paper is important because it offers, for the first time, a data-driven multi-dimensional assessment tool of cues associated with sexual desire in women."

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COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning