Anal touch can enhance female orgasm, study says

A survey of 3,017 American women aged 18 to 93 investigated the ways in which women discover, engage with, and enjoy anal stimulation and penetration, and how it can enhance female orgasm.

This was the first large-scale study on the topic focused on specific techniques of pleasurable anal touch for women (without full penetration).

The result highlighted three specific forms of anal touch considered most pleasurable by them: around the anus (40% of the interviewees); superficial (touch the surface with maximum penetration equivalent to the fingertip – 35%) and touch with paired stimulus (40%). In the latter, women also have superficial anal penetration, but while the finger, penis or toy is inserted, vaginal sex or clitoral masturbation also takes place.

External and internal anus stimuli during sex were potentiators of female orgasm for four out of ten respondents. In superficial penetration, the favorite of 28.3% of them was the partner’s finger, followed by the penis (25.7%), sex toys (17.4%) and the finger itself (15.4%).

The authors are researchers from the University of Indiana, in the United States, and the company For Goodness Sake, who collected data from various documents such as the OMGYES Pleasure Report and also through direct interviews with a thousand women in the sample.

In all, 92.3% of the participants described themselves as heterosexual and 73.4% were in some type of fixed relationship (marriage, engagement or dating). Data collected by the researchers show that about half of American women have experienced some form of anal sex, although touch or anal stimulation is rarely inserted into conversations about sexuality.

“We’re not just talking about anal penetration or what’s commonly called ‘anal sex’. Instead, we’re talking about any kind of touching outside or inside the anus or [ainda] the anus with a fingertip, toy, penis or anything else,” the authors state in the article.

The results were published in the international scientific journal Plos One. The purpose of the study is to bring the knowledge of these techniques to more women, giving them more chances to understand their own preferences, to talk about it and enjoy sexual pleasure.

For Priscila Junqueira, 44, a sexologist and psychologist who has been working in the area for two decades, this type of information helps to break taboos and reinforces the importance of adequate sexuality education.

“I realize in my practice, in the anamnesis I do with women and couples in therapy, that the subject is a taboo. And that’s because people are still prejudiced against anal sex due to lack of knowledge”, said the psychologist. Co-founder of IPSER ​(Instituto de Psicologia e Sexologia Essência Rara), the sexologist explains that the anus is a region extremely rich in nerve endings and, therefore, can also generate pleasure.

“When the study brings this possibility for women to have pleasure, we manage to break a little the prejudice of these women going for anal sex. Without this knowledge, I don’t know that it’s an erogenous zone, I can’t even touch it. There are women who do feel pleasure in penetration, but can, through all erotic games, open up to the new”, said the sexologist.

She also reported that Brazilian women are now able to talk more about the topic. “Before, it wasn’t even talked about. A question from that years ago, they would answer ‘this is not for me.’ Now they say ‘I tried it once’ or ‘I tried it and saw it could be done another way, with a lubricant, and I include that in my practice,'” she said.