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Another conference presentation that has been getting the media all a-flutter recently is study that includes video footage of an fMRI scan of a woman reaching orgasm due to self-stimulation. Although some similar research has been
conducted in recent years, the inclusion of video footage has garnered a great deal of attention. Although once again there is a lack of primary data available and the scan was only performed on one woman, the video is certainly striking. At peak of orgasm, almost all brain regions are active—in fact, the researchers claim that the only time when more of the brain is active is during an epileptic seizure.
These results are certainly interesting, but how valuable can neuroimaging be to sex research? Data from one person can hardly be considered applicable to all women; however, it is a starting point for a still poorly understood phenomenon. Until relatively recently, the medical and scientific establishment denied that female orgasm existed at all, and female sexual functioning was the subject of a great deal of myth and spurious assumption. This research has been trumpeted by some as proof of the “existence” of female orgasm, but this assertion mistakenly assumes that brain activations have primacy of truth over behavioral evidence. Rather than showing whether female orgasm exists, this research can show how it is realized by the brain.
The purpose of sex research is not only to discover how sexual functions operate in healthy individuals, but also to assist those individuals who experience sexual difficulties that cause them distress. To this end, this study may be of value when combined with the authors' previous research into vaginal sensitivity to self-stimulation in woman with spinal-cord injuries. Even those women with injuries that left them unable to receive signals from the genital sensory nerves were able to reach orgasm due to self-stimulation of the vagina. MRI showed that this was due to signals received along the vagus nerv