Nonconscious processing of sexual information: a generalization to women

Abstract

Sexually competent stimuli may nonconsciously activate sexual memory and set up sexual responding. In men, subliminally presented sexual pictures facilitated recognition of sexual information. The goal of the two experiments reported here was to investigate to what extent this result can be generalized to women. A direct replication in women failed in Experiment 1. In Experiment 2, besides the male-oriented sexual picture set, pictures of two other sets were presented: female-oriented sexual pictures and baby pictures. Effects of the menstrual cycle were also examined. In Experiment 2 only male-oriented pictures showed a facilitation effect. Sensitivity for reproductive stimuli was enhanced during the midluteal phase. Like men, women may nonconsciously recognize a stimulus as sexual. This recognition process seems unrelated to the potential of the stimulus to elicit subjective arousal.