Thermistor Measurement of Male Sexual Arousal

Penile erection is accompanied by genital vasocongestion which increases penile skin temperature. These changes should be measurable using thermistors attached to the penis. The present study compared the UUT51J1 Uni-Curve thermistor placed on the penis with the Barlow strain gauge in the assessment of sexual arousal in 8 heterosexual males. Sexual stimuli consisted of 3, 3-min exposures to heterosexually explicit black-and-white videotapes. The results indicated that the two measures were highly positively correlated with each other and with self-report. However, the strain gauge followed detumescence more closely than the thermistor and was more strongly correlated with subjective arousal. Also, the two probes differed as to when they reached peak response. The strain gauge typically reached its highest point prior to the end of the film, while the thermistor always peaked during the early post-film interval. The thermistor's slow transition from temperature increases to decreases during the initial moments of detumescence appeared to be its principal shortcoming as a measure of male sexual arousal.     

Groin Skin Temperature: Testing the Validity of a Relatively Unobtrusive Physiological Measure of Psychosexual Arousal

The validity of groin skin temperature as a relatively unobtrusive physiological measure of psychosexual arousal was tested for both males and females. Groin skin temperature and hemodynamic (penile circumference, vaginal blood volume, and vaginal pulse amplitude) changes induced by erotic and non-erotic film presentations were monitored in 10 male and 10 female volunteers. Significant positive correlations (p<.001) between the measures were obtained for 16 of 20 subjects. Implications of the findings for detecting low levels of psychosexual arousal are discussed.     

The Relationship Between Sexual Arousal Experience and Genital Response

In studies of sexuality, there has been a wide divergence in findings concerning the correlation between the subjective and genital measurements of sexual arousal. The present study is aimed at helping clarify this situation by examining the role of certain factors involved in determining the subjective-genital correlation. Thus, the following study was designed to (1) employ a methodology aimed at improving the correlation between the subjective and genital measurements of arousal in women, and (2) determine the effect of attending to bodily cues upon the subjective-genital relationship. To accomplish this end, 36 female subjects were separated into two experimental groups and one control group. The experimental groups were given instructions suggesting that they attend to either genital or non-genital body signals of sexual arousal while viewing a series of 10 erotic slides. Subjects in the control group were given no attention instructions. Subjective levels of arousal to the erotic slides were scaled by having subjects set the intensity of sound and light to match their intensity of arousal (cross-modality matching) and by using a rating scale. Genital measures of sexual arousal consisted of measurement of vaginal pulse amplitude. Analyses revealed that group computed correlations were very high and that individually computed subjective-genital correlations were highest in the attention groups. Paying attention to bodily cues has a significant and positive effect on the subjective-genital relationship. Possible explanations for these results are given along with a discussion of the role of methodological variables in influencing the genital-subjective correlation. The finding of high levels of correlation raises doubts on the heretofore made assumption of low subjective-genital correlations for women.     

Male Sexual Arousal and the Law of Initial Value

Penile circumference was measured for 24 men before and during exposure to erotic material of matched content presented in 5 modes: film, slides, spoken, written, and fantasy. Stimulation in each case involved 8, 2-min episodes graded in content from low to high heterosexual arousal value. Three indices were used to test for the Law of Initial Value (LIV). No consistent evidence was obtained that stimulation levels or change scores varied systematically with prestimulus baseline values. The data indicate that male sexual arousal can be investigated without the need to adjust change scores to take into account initial value, at least when guided relaxation has been used to stabilize basal rates.     

Shock Threat and Sexual Arousal: The Role of Selective Attention, Thought Content, and Affective States

In an attempt to detail cognitive processes during anxiety and sexual arousal, 16 heterosexual males were presented with brief erotic audiotapes simultaneous with four levels of shock threat (no shock, half tolerance, tolerance, and twice tolerance threat). Subjects were instructed to pay close attention to the audiotapes, following which a sentence recognition task was administered to assess stimulus-focused attention. Additionally at these times, they were given a thought-listing task and completed a series of affect ratings. Tumescence and subjective arousal were monitored continuously during the erotic stimuli. Results revealed that tolerance shock threat decreased tumescence (p<.05). In contrast, recognition memory was greatest during tolerance shock threat and diminished during twice tolerance shock threat, which also produced increased reports of emotional stales. Issues regarding the relation between cognition and sexual arousal are discussed, including implications for understanding sexual dysfunction.     

A Psychophysiological Exploration of Sexual Arousal Patterns in Females and Males

Fifty-nine female and 39 male undergraduates completed 3 sessions of a psychophysiological study on sexual arousal. Subjects were assigned to one of six experimental groups. Subjects within each group were exposed to a series of four audio-tapes, and were asked to fantasize before and after the tape series. Tapes varied in their erotic and romantic content, and two sex role dimensions were also varied across tapes. Dependent measures included scaled subjective reports, genital pulse amplitude and blood volume responses, heart rate, and finger pulse amplitude. Erotic contents were significantly more sexually arousing than nonerotic contents for both sexes. Romantic content did not significantly enhance the facilitation of sexual arousal. Nontraditional sex roles were significantly more arousing for females, with a similar nonsignificant trend for males. There were significant correlations between genital pulse amplitude and subjective reports of arousal; however, for females the genital blood volume measure showed less reliable agreement with subjective report. Genital pulse amplitude was the most reliable and precise indicator of arousal and accounted for the most variance across conditions. No significant changes occurred on the heart rate and finger pulse amplitude measures. Although subjects were able to become aroused by fantasy alone, listening to erotic tapes did not facilitate their ability to be sexually aroused during fantasy.     

Female Sexual Arousal and the Menstrual Cycle

Abstract

Self-reports of sexual arousal were significantly affected by conditions under which they were elicited. Such self-reports in women not taking oral contraceptives were congruent with a hormonal basis for such arousal only when the women were “unaware” that the study investigated sexual arousal as a function of the menstrual cycle. The “unaware” condition was operationalized by means of daily self-reports elicited from males and females for 11 weeks under the guise of a study of biological rhythms. A composite of one to three menstrual cycles for 26 women not taking oral contraceptives showed that sexual arousal during the luteal phase, when progesterone is relatively high, was significantly lower compared to peaks around ovulation, and premenstrual and late menstrual days (p<.02). For the “aware” condition, women were asked to remember moods for the premenstrual, menstruating and luteal phases of the very last cycle on which they had just finished giving “unaware” daily self-reports. A 2 × 3 analysis of variance (with “aware” versus “unaware” conditions and premenstrual, menstruating, and luteal phases of the last cycle as the two independent variables) yielded a significant interaction effect with F=6.5, df=2, 50, p<.003. In the “unaware” condition, sexual arousal was reported lowest during the luteal phase. The opposite pattern was reported in the “aware” condition. The results suggest that cyclical variability may not be simply due to women's misattribulions. However, “awareness” has an effect on self-report measures and may bias reports according to cultural stereotypes. Daily self-reports of sexual arousal for men were averaged over the duration of the study. This average was 3.16. The equivalent average for women not taking oral contraceptives was 2.35 and for women taking oral contraceptives was 2.62. Analysis of variance of these three means yielded a significant difference with F=4.49, df=2, 59, p<.02.     

Physiological Assessment of Sexual Arousal in Women

The purpose of this investigation was to validate the use of vaginal photoplethysmography along with six other physiological measures for the assessment of sexual arousal in women. Six women in counterbalanced order were presented control, dysphoric, and sexually arousing videotapes. Subjective ratings revealed that subjects experienced moderate levels of sexual and anxiety arousal during the videotapes, and comprehension quizzing at the end of the experiment showed that subjects attended to the content. Heart rate, heart rate variability, and skin conductance response failed to discriminate between any of the videotapes. In order from highest to lowest sensitivity, vaginal blood volume, skin conductance, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, and forehead temperature showed significant increases during the erotic videotape. Though sensitive, skin conductance appeared to he unreliable. Areas for further research were identified.     

Sexual arousal patterns of bisexual men revisited

Men who identify themselves as bisexual report feeling sexually aroused by both men and women. However, past research has not demonstrated that such men exhibit substantial genital arousal to both male and female erotic stimuli, suggesting that they identify as bisexual for reasons other than their genital arousal pattern. The purpose of the present study was to examine arousal patterns among bisexual men who were recruited using stringent criteria involving sexual and romantic experience with both men and women in order to increase the likelihood of finding a bisexual arousal pattern. Bisexual men in the present study demonstrated bisexual patterns of both subjective and genital arousal. It remains unclear which pattern is most typical of contemporary bisexual men: the present results supporting a bisexual arousal pattern, or previous results not finding one. In either case, understanding men with bisexual arousal patterns could help illuminate the etiology and development of male sexual orientation.     

The Reliability of Arousal Threshold During Sleep

Thirty-five subjects from two independent studies were awakened at EEG-defined periods during the night with 1000 Hz ascending tone series. Awakenings were made five to eight times per night during stage 2, stage 4, or REM sleep over a series of nights in good and poor sleepers. Reliability was assessed within stage, within night, between stages, and between nights. Good and poor sleepers did not differ in either depth of sleep or reliability of arousal threshold and were thus pooled in the analyses. From night to night, the most consistency was seen in stage 4 (r=.74), although REM reliability (r?₁= .49) and stage 2 reliability (r?₁= .50 and r?₁= .69 in the two respective studies) estimates were also greater than zero. Early sleep onset and morning arousals were more variable. Reliability estimates on arousal thresholds taken within the same night for stage 2 were r= .64 and r?₁= .77 for the two studies and r= .96 for REM. The depth of sleep was not correlated with awake auditory threshold. It was concluded that five or six carefully placed arousals could give a good estimate of an individual's usual arousal threshold.     

Sexual arousal of the female hamster

Elicitation of the lordosis response, using a manual stimulation technique, was facilitated by contact with an anaesthetized male hamster. Exposure to an intact anaesthetized male decreased latency to lordosis and increased lordosis duration. Exposure to a gonadectomized anaesthetized hamster significantly reduced the latency to lordosis, but did not affect lordosis duration.     

Does the Menstrual Cycle Play a Role in Sexual Arousal?

Menstrual cycle effects on erotic arousability were tested in 13 women aged 20–28. Vaginal blood volume and pulse amplitude were measured with a light emitting diode photoplethysmograph, labial temperature was measured by a small thermistor, and subject self-report of arousal was estimated on a 7-point Likert scale in response to audio erotic tapes and fantasy over five different phases of the menstrual cycle. Pre-session levels of blood volume and labial temperature showed no important changes across the cycle, but pooled blood volume, pulsatile blood volume and labial temperature reliably demonstrated sexual arousal during tape and fantasy sessions. Repeated measures analyses of variance and covariance of physiological change scores from baseline and subjective ratings failed to demonstrate that significant changes in self-reports, vaginal blood volume, vaginal pulse amplitude, or labial temperature occurred as a function of menstrual cycle phase. This study provides objective physiological evidence that there appears to be no one phase in the menstrual cycle during which women are more sexually arousable to erotic stimuli as detected by these physiological measures.     

The Measurement of Human Penile Tumescence

The techniques of penile measurement have been developed in numerous laboratories in Europe, Australia, and the United States. Most researchers now use either circumference or volumetric devices, depending on the research rationale. Thermistors have not been adequately evaluated. This paper reviews the important measurement issues associated with each device, as well as relevant construction information. Examples of applied research are provided. With respect to overall efficacy of the transducers, we recommend volumetric procedures where precision of measurement is of critical importance. However, for efficiency and ease of use the circumference devices, particularly the mercury-in-rubber gauge, appear optimal. Penile tumescence measurement is of fundamental importance in determining basic parameters of the psychophysiological process of human sexual arousal.     

A Cognitive-Physiological Process Model of Sexual Arousal and Response

Three decades of research have focused on identifying cognitive and physiological processes in human emotion. The mechanisms by which these components interact to mediate sexual arousal are unknown, and scientific knowledge on women Is lacking. New findings have identified (a) key components of sexual response, (b) mechanisms by which cognitive and physiological processes form a feedback loop in the mediation of sexual arousal, and (c) a method to increase genital response and cognitive expectancy, via pairing general autonomic activation and physiological genital feedback. This approach interrupted the dysfunctional process and initiated a positive cognitive-physiological feedback loop of sexual arousal to levels comparable with sexually functional women within 3 min. This empirically derived process model identifies a cognitive-physiological pathway for sexual response, and a potential common pathway for emotion processing and an integrated behavioral medicine approach to women's health.     

Urinary Acid Phosphatase Secretion Under Different Arousal Conditions

Seventy-three undergraduate males were randomly assigned to five different conditions, sexual, anxiety, aggressive, and laughter arousals and a control group, as a test of the hypothesis that urinary acid phosphatase is a specific indicator of sexual arousal. Pre- and post-arousal urine samples were analyzed for the amount of urinary acid phosphatase (AP) present, and significant increases occurred only in the sexual arousal condition. Both general and specific elements of arousal as well as a possible link between sexual arousal and anxiety are discussed. These findings support earlier results of studies in this area.     

Presleep Arousal and Sleep Disturbances in Children

Study Objectives:

To determine if associations between presleep arousal and sleep disturbance reported in adults are also characteristic of children.

Design:

Linear regression analyses examined whether somatic and cognitive presleep arousal predicted sleep disturbances.

Setting:

Two inner city schools, London, UK.

Participants:

One hundred twenty-three children aged 8 to 10 years, 49% boys, from ethnically diverse backgrounds.

Interventions:

N/A

Measurements and Results:

Children completed the Sleep Self-Report and the Pre-sleep Arousal Scale (comprising somatic and cognitive subscales). Parents completed the Child Sleep Habits Questionnaire. In separate models, both somatic (~ = 0.44, P < 0.001, R² = 0.19) and cognitive (~ = 0.48, P < 0.001, R² = 0.23) presleep arousal predicted the Sleep Self-Report total score. Somatic (~ = 0.28, P <.01, R² = 0.08) and cognitive (~ = 0.37, P < 0.001, R² = 0.14) arousal also predicted Sleep Self-Report insomnia items in separate models. These results were partially replicated when using the parent report of the Child Sleep Habits Questionnaire. When somatic and cognitive items were included in the same models, cognitive but not somatic arousal significantly predicted (most definitions of) sleep disturbance.

Conclusions:

Cognitive, and to a lesser extent somatic, presleep arousal appears to be associated with sleep disturbances in children. This suggests that further research into cognitive aspects of sleep disturbance in children is warranted—as incorporating this information into treatments may eventually prove fruitful.

Citation:

Gregory AM; Willis TA; Wiggs L; Harvey AG. Presleep arousal and sleep disturbances in children. SLEEP 2008;31(12):1745–1747.     

Arousal episodes during sleep in the neonatal rat

Hippocampal EEG and neck EMG activity were recorded in restrained as well as in unrestrained rat pups following treatment with drugs which selectively suppress wakefulness and active sleep, respectively. Chloral hydrate did not affect active sleep but eliminated the bursts of coordinated total-body movements which were seen during sleep, especially under conditions of restraint. Chlorimipramine, in contrast, suppressed active sleep while sparing the coordinated total-body motility. It is concluded that these latter movements represent an episodic arousal phenomenon, against a background of quiet sleep, which becomes intensified under certain postural conditions.     

Type a Behavior and Self Reports of Cardiovascular Arousal in Adolescents

Abstract

The association of adolescent Type A behavior with reports of cardiovascular arousal and sleep disturbances was examined. Previous research on the Framingham cohort indicates a cross-sectional relationship between symptoms of arousal and Type A behavior in both sexes, and a prospective relationship bet ween arousal and coronary heart disease incidence in women. Certain sleep patterns have been related to behavior pattern status in a college-aged population. In the current study, Type A behavior was assessed by the Adolescent Structured Interview (ASI), which yields three factor scores: interview behaviors, impatience, and harddriving. Endorsement of symptoms of cardiovascular arousal and sleep disturbances was compared for subjects above and below the median on each of the factor scores. The results showed that the impatience score is strongly related to reports of cardiovastular arousal, the harddriving factor yields a weaker relationship, and the interview behaviors factor was unrelated to reports of arousal. No relationship of Tvpe A behavior and sleep disturbances was found. These data support the usefulness of the component scoring of the ASI, and are encouraging of future research on the cardiovascular processes of the young.     

喹硫平对男性精神分裂症患者催乳素及性功能的影响

目的探讨喹硫平对男性精神分裂症患者催乳素及性功能的影响。方法将2006年4月至2008年4月首次来我院住院的已婚男性精神分裂症患者随机分为喹硫平组和利培酮组,分别于治疗前和治疗后2周、4周、8周查血清催乳素、阳性与阴性症状量表（PANSS）、副反应量表（TESS）、男性性功能症状记分测量表。结果喹硫平对男性精神分裂症患者催乳素及性功能影响均较小。两组病人治疗效果相当,副反应均较轻。结论喹硫平对男性精神分裂症患者催乳素及性功能影响较小,可以增加患者的服药依从性,减少复发,对男性患者来说不失为一种良好的治疗药物。