The Health Benefits of Masturbation for Women

As many psychologists readily acknowledge, women around the world have been socialized to believe that their sexual needs and desires are less important than those of men.  In many cultures, women are not permitted to verbalize sexual pleasure, dissatisfaction, or longing–outside the act of procreation.  Due to wide-spread cultural taboos and societal judgment, many women feel that masturbation is somehow wrong; spawning feelings of guilt or shame.  But as science now shows, there is enormous potential for physical and emotional healing through expressing this aspect of female sexuality.  Read more . . .

The Health Benefits of Masturbation for Men

Numerous cross-cultural scientific studies reaching all the way back to the famous Kinsey surveys of the 1940s show that 95 percent of all men say they have masturbated.  It is apparently a physical function we are designed to perform, serving a number of beneficial physiological purposes.  "We [of the animal species] are programmed, as best we know, to need orgasms," says clinical sexologist Dr. Gloria Brame, Ph.D., from the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality in Athens, Ga.  And for the male of the species, "It’s a fundamental aspect of men’s health, right up there with brushing your teeth. It relieves stress and keeps everything about your body—your heart rate, blood pressure, reproductive system, brain chemistry—in very good shape.  Men are doing themselves a favor with regular ejaculation," Brame says, "it cleans out the plumbing."  Supporting Brame’s perspective are numerous wide-sweaping studies including those conducted by an Australian team of researchers led by Graham Giles of the Cancer Council Victoria in Melbourne, Australia, who reported that frequent masturbation may serve an especially important health purpose, that of lowering a man’s risk of developing prostate cancer.  Read more . . .