Finding Our Viagra: The Science of Sex

One of the strangest jobs I ever had was interviewing women about their sex lives for a market research company. I was pretty sure the research was being done for a large pharmaceutical company—an industry near the top of my industries I love to hate—but I was fresh out of graduate school and extremely broke. The job paid well and was simple. Women were recruited to take a sex survey at seven different research centers around the country. After they took the survey, I would call and ask them about the survey questions. The company was trying to validate a sexual enhancement questionnaire, and this validation required me to ask questions about questions, the majority of them pertaining to wetness, orgasm, lubrication, arousal, and relationships. At first, asking things like “what does the phrase feeling anxious about sex mean to you?” or “what does the phrase easy for me to get lubricated (or wet) mean to you?” was somewhat awkward, but after the fifteenth or so interview, I got used to it.

I walked away from that job knowing two things. One was an assurance that I never wanted to do market research. The other was something I knew in my gut, but corroboration helped to make it obvious: on average, feeling comfortable, relaxed, self-confident, and emotionally connected were integral components of a woman’s sexual enjoyment. This might come as a “no duh” to any woman that’s ever had an orgasm or anyone that’s every tried to arouse her into one, but for scientists trying to crack the female sexual code, this is tough stuff. Ever since the development of male impotence drugs, there’s been a clamor to find an equivalent for women. If a little pill could turn a dud into a stud, certainly there must be a chemical to make Sandy randy.

But the story of Viagra’s failure highlights the fact that arousal and desire aren’t so simple in the womenfolk. Pfizer spent almost a decade trying to prove Viagra could enhance sexual function in women, and in 2004, it finally gave up. Though the drug increased blood flow to the clitoris—just as it increases blood flow to the penis causing erection—there was no evidence indicating that women’s lack of arousal was due to lack of blood flow. Turns out, we’re a bit more complex than that.

Though arousal and desire are intricately linked in men (see naked woman, get aroused, want to have sex), the two things are not always connected in women.