Why Women Have Sex: Women Reveal the Truth About Their Sex Lives, from Adventure to Revenge (and Everything in Between)

by Cindy M. Meston, David M. Buss

Overview

An unparalleled exploration of the mysteries underlying women's sexuality that rivals the culture-shifting Kinsey Report, from two of America's leading research psychologists

Do women have sex simply to express love, experience pleasure, or reproduce? When clinical psychologist Cindy M. Meston and evolutionary psychologist David M. Buss, both at the University of Texas at Austin, joined forces to investigate women's underlying sexual motivations, what they found astonished them.

Using women's own words, and backed by extensive scientific evidence, the authors delve into the use of sex as a defensive tactic against a mate's infidelity, a ploy to boost social status, a barter for household chores, and even as a cure for a migraine headache. Meston and Buss offer a revelatory examination of the deep-seated psychology and biology that often unwittingly drive women to have sex, sometimes in pursuit of joy, and sometimes for darker, more disturbing reasons.

Why Women Have Sex stands as the richest and deepest psychological understanding of women's sexuality yet achieved and promises to inform every woman's (and her partner's) awareness of her relationship to sex.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780312662653
Publisher:	St. Martin's Publishing Group
Publication date:	12/07/2010
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	336
Sales rank:	467,941
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Cindy M. Meston is one of the world's leading researchers on women's sexuality, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, and director of the Sexual Psychophysiology Laboratory. David M. Buss, one of the founders of evolutionary psychology, is a professor at the University of Texas at Austin and is the author The Evolution of Desire and The Dangerous Passion.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Inside the Sexual Mind xi

1 What Turns Women On?

Scent, Body, Face, Voice, Movement, Personality, and-Yes-Humor 1

2 The Pleasure of it

Sexual Gratification and Orgasm 28

3 The Thing Called Love

An Emotional and Spiritual Connection 50

4 The Thrill of Conquest

From Capturing a Mate to Poaching One 78

5 Green-Eyed Desire

From Guarding a Mate to Trading Up 99

6 A Sense of Duty

When Responsibility or Guilt Calls 117

7 A Sense of Adventure

When Curiosity, Variety-and Mate Evaluation-Beckon 145

8 Barter and Trade

The Value of Sex-Literally and Figuratively 167

9 The Ego Boost

Body Image, Attention, Power, and Submission 191

10 The Dark Side

Sexual Deception, Punishment, and Abuse 211

11 Sexual Medicine

The Health Rewards of a Sex Life 236

Conclusion: Women's Sexual Complexities 261

Notes 265

Acknowledgments 291

Index 295

Editorial Reviews

Occasionally poetic, always candid. The book is filled with insights with which to start conversations.” —Psychology Today

“Why Women Have Sex is an endlessly well informed and irresistibly readable book. The candor of the women's responses and the authors' knowledge of all that has been happening in the world of sex research for the past few decades combine to make it the most fascinating and illuminating look at female sexuality since Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Female.” —Mary Roach, author of Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex

“What an excellent book! You will come away from reading Why Women Have Sex with a better understanding of what turns women on or off, the physiology underlying desire and arousal, the likely consequences when sex is undertaken to thwart or titillate a partner, and the complexity of sexual desire. There is not much more one can ask for—to be at once enlightened and entertained by two trustworthy and sympathetic experts.” —Sandra R. Leiblum Ph.D., author of Getting the Sex You Want

“Why Women Have Sex is full of fascinating research that will help everyone better understand and appreciate their sexual selves.” —Christiane Northrup, M.D., author of The Secret Pleasures of Menopause and The Wisdom of Menopause

“Why Women Have Sex is a captivating tour of what psychology and biology can tell us about women's sexual motivation. Meston and Buss are first-rate scientists and skilled writers who actually answer the question that everyone was afraid to ask.” —Daniel Gilbert, professor of psychology, Harvard University, and author of Stumbling on Happiness

From the Publisher

Why Women Have Sex is an endlessly well informed and irresistibly readable book. The candor of the women's responses and the authors' knowledge of all that has been happening in the world of sex research for the past few decades combine to make it the most fascinating and illuminating look at female sexuality since Kinsey's Sexual Behavior in the Human Female.

author of Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Scienc Mary Roach