Effectiveness of undergraduate human sexuality courses in enhancing women’s sexual functioning

ABSTRACT

When young adult women and men engage in sexual encounters, the former have significantly fewer orgasms than the latter. This gendered orgasm disparity, often referred to as an orgasm gap, is theorised to be due to a multitude of societal issues. The purpose of this study was to assess whether a Psychology of Human Sexuality university course, which covered the orgasm gap and the cultural factors responsible for it, would be effective at enhancing women’s sexual pleasure and functioning. Specifically, this study compared women university students enrolled in this course to those in a Psychology of Personality course  (i.e., no sexual content) and a Human Sexuality and Culture class (i.e., sexual content but not specifically covering the orgasm gap). Participants (N = 271 women) answered pre-test and post-test questions regarding their sexual practices, attitudes towards women’s genitals, cognitive distraction during sexual activity, entitlement to sexual pleasure, orgasm quality, and partner communication during sexual activity. Students in the Psychology of Human Sexuality improved on virtually all the measures of sexual functioning from pre-test to post-test. Those enrolled in the other courses evidenced minimal or no changes. Implications and future directions are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Orgasm gap
• sexual pleasure
• sexuality education
• human sexuality

Disclosure statement

One of the authors, Dr. Laurie Mintz, was the instructor of one of the courses under study. However, in order to minimize the conflict, she was not involved in the data analysis or collection, nor was she the major contributor to the writing of the manuscript.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.