DETERMINANTS OF SUBJECTIVE EXPERIENCE OF SEXUAL AROUSAL IN WOMEN - FEEDBACK FROM GENITAL AROUSAL AND EROTIC STIMULUS CONTENT

Sixty-two women participated in a study designed to explore the associ ation between genital and subjective sexual arousal. Four stimulus con ditions were created, designed to evoke differential patterns of genit al arousal over time. Subjects were instructed to report sensations in their genitalia while being exposed to the same erotic stimulus on re peated trials or to a series of varying erotic stimuli. Detection of g enital arousal was facilitated by the occurrence of changes in genital arousal over trials. That is, genital and subjective sexual arousal w ere linearly related in conditions that resulted in large differences in genital arousal over trials, whereas such a relation was absent in conditions in which genital arousal levels remained relatively constan t. In women, peripheral feedback from consciously detected genital aro usal seems to be a relatively unimportant determinant of subjective se xual arousal.