sexology

MULTIORGASM

Early-20th-century sex researchers focused on female orgasm as a major topic. Their questioners sought interviews with female subjects concerning their orgasmic response patterns. Small numbers of these respondents reported multiorgasmic patterns. In 1929, for example, G.V. Hamilton reported that five of his 100 female subjects were "repeaters," that is, they had multiple orgasms. He said that they reported anywhere from two or three to a score or more orgasms to the man's one. Lewis Terman, in 1938, reported that 96 of his sample of 792 women were typically multiorgasmic. This was 12.6 percent of those responding. Multiorgasm was not closely correlated to the reported marital happiness of respondents.

Next, chronologically, came the studies of Kinsey and his associates in 1948 and 1953. It is not always clear whether the Kinsey data on multiorgasm resulted from interview or direct observation. Kinsey made it clear that "orgasm may occur without the emission of semen" in men, thus clearly differentiating orgasm from ejaculation. He found that 55.5 percent of his preadolescent male sample was multiorgasmic and explained that this capacity was lost rapidly; by age 15, only 20 percent were still multiorgasmic. Less than 10 percent of the males were multiorgasmic between the ages of 25 and 60. Even though Kinsey clearly distinguishes between ejaculation and orgasm, he apparently used the terms synonymously, along with "climax," in describing the high frequency of male sexual outlet.

Kinsey reported that 14 percent of his female sample of 5,940 subjects "regularly responded with multiple orgasm" in human coitus. He made a comparison of multiple orgasm in females and males, reporting about 15 percent of each to be multiorgasmic at ages 15 to 20. From ages 25 to 60, females remained at the 15-percent level, with 5 percent more typical of the males for this 40-year period. Finally, Kinsey emphasized that only small percentages (5 percent-15 percent) of adult males and females regularly experience multiorgasm in the social context of either petting or coitus.

Masters and Johnson further documented the multiorgasmic capacity of both females and males. In their interviews of multiorgasmic females following the laboratory experience, the respondents reported that they found the subsequent orgasms more subjectively pleasurable than the initial one. These continuous orgasmic experiences contrasted with male subjective reports that the discrete orgasms following the initial orgasm and ejaculation were less pleasurable. Masters and Johnson indicated that many women were unsatisfied with one orgasm and desired multiorgasms for full satisfaction.

Since that time, others have continued to report multiorgasms in various studies. Robbins and Jensen studied multiple orgasm in men at the Center for Marital and Sexual Studies, in Long Beach, California. Individuals associated with the laboratory continued to do research on the topic, on the basis of a sample of 751 subjects, 469 females and 282 males, ranging in age from 18 to 70. The study did not rely on verbal reports of orgasm but monitored it with a Beckman R411 dynograph. Measurement of orgasm involved monitoring of capillary blood flow in various parts of the body, as well as heartbeat, heart rate, respiration, galvanic skin response, and pelvic contractions; the latter was monitored in the anus, vagina, and uterus.

Though the parameters of change varied with the subject, all showed change at orgasm, and the pattern of individual function was established for each subject. These patterns could not be differentiated by sex. During orgasm, the heart rate, which had been at a baseline of approximately 70 beats per minute, rises to approximately 120–130 beats per minute at orgasm for females and to 150–160 beats per minute for males. The subject then returns to a normal resting state. This is called a discrete orgasm. Physical condition and drugs are significant factors in wide variations of cardiac data.

In another pattern, the heart rate starts at a baseline of 70 beats per minute and reaches a peak, but rather than returning to the baseline, it remains high, dropping only 10 to 20 beats between orgasms in a series of continuous orgasms. A third pattern is a combination of the first two, usually with one or two discrete orgasms taking place before what Hartman and Fithian call "continuous orgasms" occur. The same multipleorgasm patterns are seen for both males and females.

In a control study by Hartman and Fithian, both orgasmic and multiorgasmic women were asked to rate their orgasmic intensity on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being least intense and 10 most intense. These evaluations were then correlated with physiological measurements. Multiply orgasmic women had more ratings in the 8–10 range than did the singly orgasmic women, who reported a less intense orgasm. This corresponded with their physiological response as measured by the parameters listed above.

The time to orgasm was markedly different for the two groups, with singly orgasmic women taking an average of 27 minutes to reach an orgasm, whereas the multiply orgasmic women averaged only 8 minutes. Multiply orgasmic women took only 1 to 2 minutes, on average, to reach a second orgasm. Subsequent orgasms tended to take less time, and 30-second intervals between orgasms were not uncommon; a few instances of 15-second intervals between orgasms were recorded. The greatest number of multiple orgasms recorded in the laboratory was 134 in an hour for a female and 16 for a male.

Dunn and Trost interviewed 21 multiply orgasmic men. Their primary group included 13 men who were always multiply orgasmic, and secondarily eight men who became multiorgasmic after age 35. The men attributed most of their multiorgasmic experience to genetic or fortuitous circumstances and rarely to deliberately planned learning. Dunn's and Trost's definition of multiple orgasm in males is similar to that at the Center, where orgasm and ejaculation are regarded as two separate phenomena. To be considered multiply orgasmic, a male must have two or more orgasms within an hour. The Dunn and Trost study differed from the Hartman and Fithian studies, which reported that in some instances the men could completely lose their erection and start over. In the Dunn and Trost sample, subjects reported a high state of arousal between orgasms.

Hartman and Fithian reported that several of their subjects had learned how to have multiple orgasms as adults by following up on an experience in which they had orgasm without ejaculation. They have concluded from their own studies and as a result of their teaching that potentially all males who are orgasmic can probably, with training and practice, become multiorgasmic; they hold the same to be true for women. Many may not want to be multiorgasmic, since time itself is always a factor in multiple orgasms. They simply take longer.