By Justin Lehmiller
What percent of the time do women reach orgasm during vaginal intercourse? Multiple studies have been published on this topic, but the results have varied consideriably, making it difficult to draw firm conclusions.
Why have the findings been so different from one study to the next? According to recent research in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, part of the reason may be due to the fact that scientists haven’t been asking the question in the same way across studies. The truth of the matter is that question wording matters when it comes to studying women’s orgasms. It matters a lot.
Most previous studies haven’t specified whether “vaginal intercourse” includes added clitoral stimulation or not. This is problematic because it means that different women may be interpreting the question in different ways. For example, some may assume intercourse includes clitoral stimulation, while others don’t. If so, this could potentially explain why there’s been so much inconsistency in research findings.
In this study, researchers surveyed more than 1,400 women about their experiences with orgasm using three different questions. Specifically, all participants answered the following:
- “What percent of the time do you come to climax (orgasm) during vaginal intercourse (vaginal intercourse: the part of intercourse with a man that occurs while the man’s penis is in the woman’s vagina)?”(‘‘Intercourse in general’’)
- “When having strictly vaginal intercourse (strictly vaginal intercourse: intercourse with no additional clitoral stimulation from hands or a vibrator at the same time vaginal intercourse is going on), what percent of the time do you reach orgasm?” (“Unassisted form”)
- “When having intercourse with additional clitoral stimulation (intercourse with additional clitoral stimulation: intercourse with additional touching or rubbing of the clitoris with hands or a vibrator at the same time that intercourse is going on), what percent of the time do you reach orgasm?”(“Assisted form”)
It turned out that orgasm frequency varied substantially across these three questions.
Specifically, when asked about intercourse in general, 22% of women said they never experience orgasm. By contrast, this number dropped to 14% for “assisted” intercourse (i.e., when clitoral stimulation was specifically included), but increased to 37% when asked about “unassisted” intercourse (i.e., when clitoral stimulation was specifically excluded).
Likewise, on average, women said they reach orgasm 31-40% of the time in response to the question about intercourse in general. By contrast, women said they reached orgasm even more often with assisted intercourse (51-60% of the time), but less often with unassisted intercourse (21-30% of the time).
Altogether, what these results reveal is that when women are asked about their experiences with orgasm during vaginal intercourse in general, different women seem to be interpreting it in different ways. Some are thinking about intercourse alone (no clitoral stimulation), some are thinking about intercourse with added clitoral stimulation, and some appear to be thinking about both of these things at the same time and averaging them together
On a side note, it’s worth mentioning that, as part of this study, approximately 1,500 men were asked to estimate how often women orgasm during both the unassisted and assisted forms. They estimated that women orgasm 61-70% of the time during assisted intercourse, compared to 41-50% of the time during unassisted intercourse.
These numbers suggest that while men do seem to recognize the important role clitoral stimulation plays with respect to the female orgasm, they tend to overestimate how often women are actually reaching orgasm. Why is that? According to the study’s authors, this “may reflect men’s difficulty in accurately detecting women’s orgasms, or alternatively, men’s difficulty in detecting when women fake orgasm.”
Together, what all of these findings demonstrate is the importance of asking women and men alike clear and detailed questions about orgasms in survey research. This will not only help give us a better idea of how often women tend to reach orgasm when having sex, but it will also help to highlight the specific forms of stimulation that women find most pleasurable.
References:
Shirazi, T., Renfro, K., Lloyd, E., & Wallen, K. (2017). Women’s Experience of Orgasm During Intercourse: Question Semantics Affect Women’s Reports and Men’s Estimates of Orgasm Occurrence. Archives of Sexual Behavior.
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Dr. Justin Lehmiller is an award winning educator and a prolific researcher and scholar. He has published articles in some of the leading journals on sex and relationships, written two textbooks, and produces the popular blog, Sex & Psychology. Dr. Lehmiller’s research topics include casual sex, sexual fantasy, sexual health, and friends with benefits. His latest book is Tell Me What You Want: The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life. Follow him on Twitter @JustinLehmiller.