Does heightened subjective sexual arousal lower pain in women if disgust is minimized?

Abstract

It has been proposed that acute pain can generally be reduced by sexual activity. Increasing subjective sexual arousal might thus help reduce pain during sex. Yet, in conflict with the view that subjective sexual arousal would generally reduce pain, previous research has failed to find that presenting a sexually arousing film stimulus attenuates pain during a cold pressor test (CPT) in women. This might be due to the sexually arousing film having also elicited disgust. Therefore, this study tested whether subjective sexual arousal could generally reduce pain, provided that concurrently-elicited disgust is minimized. Female undergraduates with no sexual dysfunction were randomly distributed through a digital list randomizer to either watch: a porn film that can elicit similar levels of disgust and sexual arousal, a porn film that elicits greater subjective sexual arousal than disgust, or a neutral train ride film (N = 174). A CPT was utilized for pain induction while simultaneously viewing the assigned films. Pain was indexed by subjective ratings of pain intensity, and CPT duration. The results showed no differences in pain intensity or pain tolerance across conditions. Thus, in this study, disgust appeared no critical moderator of the relationship between sexual arousal and pain. The findings converge to the conclusion that, in women, subjective sexual arousal does not generally reduce the experience of pain. This might also imply that increasing subjective sexual arousal alone might not be sufficient to reduce genital pain, though further research is needed to test this inference given that pain sensitivities may differ across the body.

Fig 1. Experimental set-up.

A research assistant was demonstrating the task. The image displays the TV screen with the film stimulus, the CPT on the left-hand side, the webcam tripod hovering over the CPT, headphones to listen to the film, and a cozy lab environment. A mouse was placed on the right-hand side table for the participants to answer the questions on-screen.

Fig 2. CPT duration in milliseconds as a function of condition.

No significant differences in CPT duration were observed, although a non-significant mean difference of nearly 20 seconds could be observed between the SEX-O and SEX-F conditions.

Fig 3. Self-reported pain ratings as a function of condition.

No significant differences in pain ratings were observed.

Fig 4. Mean correlations between sexual arousal and disgust, measured after the CPT in both SEX conditions.

A significant effect is shown between sexual arousal and disgust in the SEX-O condition, and a similar non-significant pattern is illustrated in the SEX-F condition.