Low sex drive in women originates in brain

Stanford, California, March 4: The sex drive of women lies in their brain. Researchers from Stanford University School of Medicine probed into the objective causes of lack of sexual interest in some women and found the root cause in their brains.

Women who have low sex drive are said to be suffering from hypoactive sexual desire disorder (HSDD).

Bruce Arnow and Dr. Leah Millheiser of Stanford Hospital & Clinics compared the brain activity of 16 women who had HSDD with 20 normal women under control group. All the women were shown some erotic video segments mixed with other non-erotic video clippings while their brains were being monitored by functional magnetic-resonance imaging.

Women were then asked for their subjective sexual arousal levels on watching the clippings, and researchers recorded the objective level of their genital arousal. Results showed identical pattern of the brain activity in both the groups while they watched non-erotic videos.

But there was relatively prominent activity happening in three particular regions in the brains of the HSDD women, when they were shown sexually arousing videos. Those three brain areas were; the medial frontal gyrus, right inferior frontal gyrus and bilateral putamen.

The medial frontal gyrus and right inferior frontal gyrus are linked with one bothering too much about his/her own or others’ mental state and holding back one’s emotional responses. These two areas showing increased activity make it clear that women with HSDD tend to control their arousal stimuli, which may partly be responsible for causing sexual dysfunction in them.

As opposed to HSDD women, control subjects showed relatively increased activity in the bilateral entorhinal cortex region of their brain while watching erotic videos. Researchers correlate this difference with their better sexual arousal response.

Researchers outlined that not the brain activity variations but excess inhibition of the sexual desire possibly leads to sexual dysfunctions.

“The results of this study provide yet another valuable tool for understanding the complexity of female sexual function as it relates to desire,” Millheiser said.

The study findings may help expand the realm of research to include inhibitions and desires in the pharmacotherapeutic approaches while treating sexual dysfunction.