Orgasm

Orgasm (from Greek , ; "excitement, swelling"), sexual climax, or simply climax, is the sudden release of accumulated sexual excitement during the sexual response cycle, characterized by intense sexual pleasure resulting in rhythmic, involuntary muscular contractions in the pelvic region. Orgasms are controlled by the involuntary or autonomic nervous system and are experienced by both males and females; the body's response includes muscular spasms (in multiple areas), a general euphoric sensation, and, frequently, body movements and vocalizations. The period after orgasm (known as the resolution phase) is typically a relaxing experience due to the release of the neurohormones oxytocin and prolactin, as well as endorphins (or "endogenous morphine"). Human orgasms usually result from physical sexual stimulation of the penis in males (typically accompanied by ejaculation) and of the clitoris (and vagina) in females. Sexual stimulation can be by masturbation or with a sexual partner (penetrative sex, non-penetrative sex, or other sexual activity). Physical stimulation is not a requisite, as it is possible to reach orgasm through psychological means. Reaching orgasm may be difficult without a suitable psychological state. During sleep, a sex dream can trigger an orgasm and the release of sexual fluids (nocturnal emission).…

Orgasm (from Greek , ; "excitement, swelling"), sexual climax, or simply climax, is the sudden release of accumulated sexual excitement during the sexual response cycle, characterized by intense sexual pleasure resulting in rhythmic, involuntary muscular contractions in the pelvic region. Orgasms are controlled by the involuntary or autonomic nervous system and are experienced by both males and females; the body's response includes muscular spasms (in multiple areas), a general euphoric sensation, and, frequently, body movements and vocalizations. The period after orgasm (known as the resolution phase) is typically a relaxing experience due to the release of the neurohormones oxytocin and prolactin, as well as endorphins (or "endogenous morphine"). Human orgasms usually result from physical sexual stimulation of the penis in males (typically accompanied by ejaculation) and of the clitoris (and vagina) in females. Sexual stimulation can be by masturbation or with a sexual partner (penetrative sex, non-penetrative sex, or other sexual activity). Physical stimulation is not a requisite, as it is possible to reach orgasm through psychological means. Reaching orgasm may be difficult without a suitable psychological state. During sleep, a sex dream can trigger an orgasm and the release of sexual fluids (nocturnal emission). The health effects surrounding the human orgasm are diverse. There are many physiological responses during sexual activity, including a relaxed state, as well as changes in the central nervous system, such as a temporary decrease in the metabolic activity of large parts of the cerebral cortex, while there is no change or increased metabolic activity in the limbic (i.e., "bordering") areas of the brain. There are sexual dysfunctions involving orgasm, such as anorgasmia. The importance of reaching orgasm for sex to be satisfying varies between individuals, and theories about the biological and evolutionary functions of orgasm differ. Brody Costa et al. suggest that women's vaginal orgasm consistency is associated with being told in childhood or adolescence that the vagina is the important zone for inducing female orgasms. Other proposed factors include how well women focus mentally on vaginal sensations during penile-vaginal intercourse, the greater duration of intercourse, and their preference for above-average penis length. Costa theorizes that vaginal orgasm is more prevalent among women with a prominent tubercle of the upper lip. His research indicates that "[a] prominent and sharply raised lip tubercle has been associated with greater odds (odds ratio = 12.3) of ever having a vaginal orgasm, and also with greater past month vaginal orgasm consistency (an effect driven by the women who never had a vaginal orgasm), than less prominent lip tubercle categories." Lip tubercle was not associated with social desirability responding, or with orgasm triggered by masturbation during penile-vaginal sex, solitary or partner clitoral or vaginal masturbation, vibrator use, or cunnilingus. An empirical study carried out in 2008 provides evidence for Freud's implied link between the inability to have a vaginal orgasm and psychosexual immaturity. In the study, women reported their past month's frequency of different sexual behaviors and corresponding orgasm rates and completed the Defense Style Questionnaire (DSQ-40), which is associated with various psychopathologies. The study concluded that a "vaginal orgasm was associated with less somatization, dissociation, displacement, autistic fantasy, devaluation, and isolation of affect." Moreover, "vaginally anorgasmic women had immature defenses scores comparable to those of established (depression, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and obsessive–compulsive disorder) outpatient psychiatric groups." In the study, a vaginal orgasm (as opposed to a clitoral orgasm) was defined as being triggered solely by penile–vaginal intercourse. According to Wilhelm Reich, the lack of women's capacity to have a vaginal orgasm is due to a lack of orgastic potency, which he believed to be the result of culture's suppression of genital sexuality. Edward Ellerker Williams, the last love of Shelley's life, was remembered by the poet in "The Boat on the Serchio", which has been considered as possibly "the grandest portrayal of orgasm in literature". In this poem, Shelley associates orgasm with death when he writes "the death which lovers love". In French literature, the term la petite mort (the little death) is a famous euphemism for orgasm; it is the representation of the man who forgets himself and the world during orgasm. Jorge Luis Borges, in the same vision, wrote in one of the several footnotes of "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" that one of the churches of Tlön claims Platonically that "All men, in the vertiginous moment of coitus, are the same man. All men who repeat a line from Shakespeare are William Shakespeare." Shakespeare himself was knowledgeable of this idea, as lines "I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes" and "I will die bravely, like a smug bridegroom", said respectively by Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing and by King Lear in the play of that ilk, are interpreted as allusions to orgasm: "to die in a woman's lap" = "to experience a sexual orgasm". Freud, in his psychoanalytic projects, such as The Ego and the Id (1923), speculates that sexual satisfaction by orgasm makes Eros ("life instinct") exhausted and leaves the field open to Thanatos ("death instinct"). In other words, with orgasm Eros fulfills its mission and gives way to Thanatos. Other modern authors have chosen to represent the orgasm without metaphors. In the novel Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928), by D. H. Lawrence, features an explicit narrative of a sexual act between a couple: "As he began to move, in the sudden helpless orgasm there awoke in her strange thrills rippling inside her..." Robert Macfarlane, in a review of the Jilly Cooper novel Pandora, discussed how it has an increased ratio of sex per page than her earlier novels, such as Riders, and that the sex is usually simple and happy, where "mutuality of orgasm is a given". He also pointed out that in Pandora there is a far greater range of sexual activities described than in other Cooper novels, that are not just vaginal penetration by a penis. ==References== ==Further reading== Banker-Riskin, Anita; Grandinetti, Deborah (1997). Simultaneous Orgasm: And Other Joys of Sexual Intimacy. Hunter House. , . Gabriele Froböse, Rolf Froböse, Michael Gross (Translator): Lust and Love: Is it More than Chemistry? Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry, , (2006). PARTRIDGE, Eric (2001). Shakespeare's bawdy: Classics Series Routledge classics. 2nd ed., Routledge. , . Plato (2001). The Banquet. (P.B. Shelley, Trans., J. Lauritsen, Ed., Foreword). Provincetown, MA: Pagan Press. WEBB, Timothy (1976). The violet in the crucible: Shelley and translation, 1976. Oxford: Clarendon Press. TED Talk by Mary Roach on 10 things you didn't know about orgasm

Text derived from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1376488344 under CC BY-SA 4.0; modifications have been made.