Gender Differences In Libido:

Shimaa Abd Allah Naser Ghorabe

Human sexual desire is the most complex form of sexual motivation of all living things. Its complexity is based on its being primarily subjective and isnot easily measured; it originates from three parts of the human brain, andtriggered by both internal and external cues.The libido is the primary source of sexual motivation and is focused onareas of the body that determine sexual arousal. These areas, which Freudtermed the erogenous zones, include the mouth, anus, and genitals. Accordingto motivational theory, sexual desire consists of the interaction of at least threevariables: drive, motivation, and wish.Female sexual desire is a complex state comprising the interactionsbetween cognitive, emotive, physiological, and behavioral processes. Becausewomen’s genitals are less visible than men’s genitals, women often areunaware of their physical sexual response. In addition, women are rarely taughtabout their sexual response.Brain activation in response to arousal is similar for both men andwomen. However, the areas of the hypothalamus that are activated duringsexual arousal are different somewhat by gender. In particular, theventromedial hypothalamus is activated during women’s sexual response,whereas the medial pre-optic area is highlighted during men’s sexual response.Men’s cingulate gyrus, thalamus, and amygdala also are more activated duringsexual arousal.Testosterone plays an important role in sexual interest and associatedsexual arousability in both sexes. The evidence points mainly to the effects oftestosterone on central arousal mechanisms. Females have about ten percent ofa male’s level of testosterone, testosterone, not estrogen causes “heightenederotic sensitivity of the clitoris, breasts, and nipples”. It maintains fullness ofgenital tissue, and accounts for romantic interest. Differences in sexual desireamong females may be due to different levels of free testosterone, which have,- 131 -in some cases, been found to be significantly lower in people with low sexdrive.Physiology of sexual arousal shows major biochemical andneurovascular similarities in men and women, apart from the obvious anatomicsexual differences. In men and women, sexual desire can anticipate arousal, beconcomitant with it, or be secondary to arousal caused by direct genitalstimulation. An increasing body of evidence suggests that central arousaloverlaps with sexual desire from the neurobiological point of view in bothsexes.Sexual desire disorders are obviously a mixture of richly varied patternsinvolving biological, psychological, and cultural factors such as sexualaversion, hypoactive sexual desire disorder more common in women whilehyperactive sexual desire is more common in men. Extensive studies haveshown that testosterone is necessary for the full-range of sexual responses andlow testosterone is associated with depression in aging men. Most individualswith hypersexuality are male, but studies that have examined both sexes reporta proportion of 8% to 40% female. Studies also suggest that the behavioralpatterns of females are different from males, with females having fewer sexualpartners and different sexual scripts.Research has indicated that a gender difference does exist, and it hasbeen reflected in a variety of measures, such as self-reported desired frequencyof sex, desired variety of sexual acts and partners, frequency of fantasy,frequency of masturbation, number of partners, frequency of thinking aboutsex, and willingness to make sacrifices in other spheres to obtain sex. Menreport desiring sex more frequently, with more partners, and with more varietythan women do, boys report sexual arousal earlier than girls do, and older mencontinue to report more sexual arousal than older women do.Gender differences in masturbation are large and consistent. Womenand girls are less likely to masturbate than men and boys, and some evidenceindicates that males who masturbate do it more frequently than females.- 132 -Most studies of extramarital activity find that men report more partnersthan women, in both heterosexual and homosexual relationships, men havemore frequent and more varied fantasies than women, and men report thinkingabout sex more often than women do. Therefore, women find it easier thanmen to live without sexual gratification. While sexual desire declined with agefor both genders, most men retained at least occasional sexual desire, while thegreat majority of women articulated no sexual desire. Men more than womenimagine doing something sexual to their partner, whereas women more thanmen imagine something sexual being done to them.Studies of male body shape concluded that women are not influenced bymale body shape alone, but rather by the ability to provide them withprotection and to be good fathers for their children. It seems that neitherphysical attractiveness nor financial status alone determine male attractiveness;females appear to stress these two factors equally. Also menstrual cycle phaseis associated with shifts in women’s mate preferences , the close associationbetween women’s estradiol and testosterone preference during the luteal phaseis suggestive evidence that attractiveness judgments may adjust not only toproximity to ovulation but also to signals that a woman is currentlyexperiencing fertile menstrual cycles.Generally, heterosexual men subjectively rate stimuli depicting nudemales or male-male sexual behavior as less sexually arousing or attractive thanstimuli including women. In contrast, women generally rate photos of bothmales and females comparably attractive or arousing, type of sexual activitydepicted in the stimuli is important to males and females in their response tosuch stimuli. In addition, eye-tracking studies find more same-sex viewinginterest in women than men, in many studies men were found to look longerthan women at pictures that they reported as more attractive. In addition, menhave more interest in close-up images of the genitals than would females due todecreased interest in contextual information. Women more than men said thatthe build up that precedes sexual encounters was an important part of theirsexual fantasies.- 133 -In response to erotic films, men and women showed many areas ofoverlap in response to sexual stimuli, men showed more differential activationof brain areas related to sexual arousal than women, different characteristics ofvisual sexual stimuli, such as the sex of the actors or situational informationincluded, may be variably effective in provoking sexual arousal in men andwomen.Islamic view to gender differences in libido point out that men havehigher libido than women. Most scholars refused the view that women have10fold higher libido than men.It Can Be Concluded That:- Evidence from multiple sources indicates that men want sex more oftenthan women in both homosexual and heterosexual relationships and at all agesand relationship stages.- Review of literature may explain why Allah ordered women to wear hijab and allowed men to have more than one wife.