Isn't this analysis, at least in some significant part, surmise. It seems that your argument could be used as an evolutionary psychological justification of social or govermental prohibition or regulation of erotic entertainment. I agree with you that self regulation always is appropriate, even though it may be inefficient and/or difficult. (Is this an evolutionary psychological argument that the maintance of "traditional values" is best suited for "happiness".) It seems to me that, in a generation, people will understand whether and, if appropriate, conclude on a broad basis that indiscrimnate pervasive sexual activity is not an efficient survival and reproductive strategy in these economic times and for STD avoidance purposes -- if the bad effects you suggest manifest on a broad societal basis. And, it would be helpful if you can address for us whether there is an evolutionary satiety mechanism that comes into effect at some point to help ensure survival? Otherwise we would eat and/or copulate ourselves into oblivion while the sabretooth cats got ready to finish us off?

I thought blogs were the place for surmising. ;-) In future posts, I'll offer even more support for what I'm saying. My book covers this material, too, and is chock full of support - considering that researchers have not been looking directly at this issue.

I suppose my thoughts could be misused, but that hazard surely isn't limited to my remarks. Moreover, I don't think regulation would curb today's erotic entertainment in the least. In any case, I'm not proposing repression. Indeed, repressing sex just makes it more exciting (and therefore more potentially addictive...because dopamine goes even higher at the "thrilling" thought of it). So if we are to move in the direction of greater balance, it will have to be of our own free will, just as you suggest.

That said, the more I learn about the effects of orgasm and sexual satiation on our neurochemistry, the more I think repression is merely risky...and no longer our biggest risk (sexually speaking). I suspect our biggest risk is now addiction. Think of video game users who can't stop, even though it proves fatal. Such games also offer dopamine fixes.

I recently read a book by the late psychiatrist Gerald G. May in which he explains why repression is less potentially damaging than addiction. One can always make the healthy choice to get better at opening up (and gradually heal repression). Addiction, however, subverts the will and can alter the brain so that normal pleasure no longer satisfies. This distorts judgment, making it very hard to make healthy choices. I'll post in the future about the experiences of porn users for whom these very predictions have become a reality. The withdrawal symptoms are intense and go on for a long time.

I wish I shared your faith that a generation of behavior will convince us to ignore the strident signals of our reward circuitry when it comes to intense sexual stimuli. The behavior of American politicians suggests that these signals are pretty hard to ignore, whatever is at stake. I don't think these folks are acting as a matter of "reproductive strategy." I think they are acting without conscious thought. High dopamine can be very insistent.

There is indeed a satiety mechanism that kicks in after sex, part of which is low dopamine (or lowered sensitivity to dopamine). There are also changes in other key neurochemicals, most of which seem to suppress dopamine as well. (Details available in "Cupid's Poisoned Arrow").

However, the satiety mechanism is a bit treacherous because the more we exhaust our sexual desire, the more uncomfortable the lows afterward. Recovery can feel so rotten (due to low dopamine), that it's very tempting to seek dopamine-raising relief. Obviously, clicking to an extreme porn video is one of the easiest sources of such "relief." Shopping, drinking alcohol, getting high, video games, etc. all offer surges of dopamine to those who like them.

Each intense high, however, brings with it a subsequent low. That's why today's superabundance is making it harder for us to return to equilibrium. It makes it easy to override our satiety mechanism, rather than wait out our discomfort until our dopamine levels return to balance. We can get caught on an uncomfortable roller coaster of highs and lows.

You just sold a book. But, I don't think that politicians are a good sample population from which to draw conclusions. People who seek public attention I suspect are more susceptible to "dopamine fixes" of the type elicit sexual activity can provide.

I concur that some aspects of internet porn can be addictive. But, I look at this "promiscuity" and contrast it with the "obsessive modesty" I see teen boys now display -- they get dressed with towels around them -- as a young man I never worried about exposure in front of other men. So, I wonder whether there ae already counter trends working of which we really are not fully aware.

I am a believer though in the potential for addiction and I can see how "on-demand diverse sex" can be addicting. I think I could "get used to it" real fast and I do not have a particularly addictive personality. But, I wondner whether "competing addictions" will crowd out at least part of the issues over sexual overabundance response.

I think this is an interesting issue though. Although I think that an active imagination and a good flexible partner can provide experiences that make internet sexuality pale. Maybe the challenge of abundance is to force adults to "actively participate" in ensuring that physical sexual relationships remain preferred. And, I think this is doable despite aging and other issues -- because I believe that sexual attraction is all in the head.

At some point I would not mind throwing out some additional observations about internet sexual content, but not in the context of this comment.

To think...I once believed that sexual freedom would result in everyone being more relaxed and natural.

Yes, politicians are generally dopamine junkies, but it's also tough when you're an alpha male, or the female equivalent, not to say "yes" to the many tempting offers that come your way. Especially when your mate is looking less and less desirable, thanks to the Coolidge Effect.

Competing addictions are a definite possibility, but would still overstimulate the brain and keep us searching for the next high (and distort judgment). Learning to balance our brain chemistry naturally seems to me the best option. And part of that is recognizing how too much of a good thing can throw us off-kilter and why.

Hope you enjoy the book.

This article has some interesting ideas that are fertile areas to explore. But why should dopamine be any more distorting than a lack of dopamine or a base level of dopamine? Brain chemistry changes produce changes in experience. As they should. But to suggest a base dopamine level, or historical scarcity are 'better' than the current situation are false arguments. It's a valuation statement with no evidence... or maybe YOUR base dopamine level feels good ergo it's best for everyone to be at those levels?

This paragraph: "As it turned out, my relationships were passionate but disconcertingly fragile. The marriages of my healthy, sensual girlfriends crumbled too, as one spouse or the other decided s/he would be better off with someone new. Why weren't our orgasm-rich relationships even more satisfying and harmonious than our parents'? They all stayed married until death parted them."

And was your parents marriage any good? Were you compatible with your partner? Were your friends?

I have a hard time thinking you or your friends had orgasm rich and intimate relationships with your husband and you divorced. I have never known a couple who divorced where they were regularly, (daily?) holding hands, making out, screwing, and caressing each other in post-coital bliss. it defies belief!

But I have known of situations where people avoid those positive experiences with each other, for all sorts of reasons, and thereby doomed their relationships.

I would also take issue with the idea of "someone new". Clearly, it's not someone new in EVERY case. Perhaps it's not someone new at all. Maybe it's someone DIFFERENT, or maybe it's just a break up.

What about this idea of the scarcity for dopamine rewards? Did historic people have fewer orgasms then we do now? Certainly there was less porn, but that does not mean there were less orgasms. I'm not sure why there should be an association between food scarcity and orgasm scarcity at all.

If at certain times there was orgasm scarcity (say 1950, 1880, 1492(old or new wold)) does that mean those periods are indicative of all of human history? The ancient greeks were certainly familiar with orgasms. And Gauguin reported that Tahitian islanders were as well.

It seems that scarcity of orgasms is driven more by the cultural milieu than a function of physical scarcity.

The general argument you make here about the drive to elicit dopamine rewards through sexual experiences undermines the arguments you make elsewhere that humans are pair-bonding mammals.

If humans are biologically driven to seek sexual encounters with new partners as a result of evolution, and they are also driven to pair-bond (for child rearing purposes or because of oxytocin sensitivity) then we should expect to see instances of human beings who pair-bond for life, pair-bond for shorter periods or pair bond to support children, and humans who are much more promiscuous.

And what we see is a variety of human sexual behaviors. Assigning positive and negative values to the variety of human sexual behaviors is not something driven by the biology, but by your own cultural and social ideas.

From a pure gene propagation stand point, a continually unhappy promiscuous philanderer, who seeks short term partnerships to alleviate unhappiness, may have more children than a contented and happy couple with 2.5 kids. For this reason I would expect philandering would not be an unusual sexual behavior in the human population, regardless of how it was seen culturally.

Thanks for your thoughts. It takes time to lay out these unfamiliar ideas, and I hope that future posts will address some of the apparent inconsistencies. For example, I will soon be explaining why "holding hands, making out, screwing, and caressing each other in post-coital bliss" do not necessarily belong in the same category.

My point is that today's sexual superabundance can overstimulate the brain. I'm not suggesting people in the past didn't have orgasm. I agree that we can't know for sure how many orgasms our ancestors had.

However, I was interested to learn that an early anthropologist A. Ernest Crawley recorded that tribal cultures all over the world believed that temporary abstinence from sex was appropriate in connection with many activities. These included hunting, warfare, planting, fishing, harvesting, wine preparation, shamanic deeds, pilgrimage, the first days of marriage, pregnancy, lactation, menstruation, and so forth. Often believed to increase abundance as well as male invincibility and vigor, such periodic abstinence was so widespread that Crawley characterized temporary chastity as an “infallible nostrum for all important undertakings and critical junctures.” (Studies of Savages and Sex, ed. Theodore Besterman (New York: E. P. Dutton and Company Inc., 1960): 19–21.

Today's assumption that mankind has generally masturbated or climaxed to satiety as often as we do today may be more unrealistic than my suggestion that excessive sexual stimuli can overtax our neurochemistry. To my mind, support for my position lies in the experience of those who discover that frequent use of today's sexual superabundance throws them into a loop where they use orgasm not just for pleasure, but to self-medicate the lows...and they experience escalation (tolerance). This suggests that our brains are not set up for constant stimulation.

High dopamine is not more distorting than lack of dopamine. Both can distort perception, and both are associated with pathological behaviors. For example, high dopamine is associated in medical research with fetishes, unhealthy risk-taking, anxiety, compulsions and so forth. And low dopamine is associated with anhedonia, inability to "love", depression, social anxiety disorder, and so forth. So you can see why dopamine fluctuations can matter, even if they do not become lasting pathological extremes. Base-level dopamine, incidentally, is critical to a sense of well-being, healthy bonding, and optimism.

Since we tend to project our state of mind onto each other, subtle changes in our feelings, brought on by such fluctuations, can have a powerful, unrecognized effect on the harmony in our relationships, especially as we spend less and less time in balance (because we are pursuing constant sexual satiation). In effect, we may get stuck on a dopamine elevator bouncing from penthouse to basement, without being able to explore the floors in between.

I applaud your skepticism. Perhaps when I get to my post about the Coolidge Effect, you will be more willing to consider the possibility that the "more orgasms = better relationships" formula has some weak points.

The fact that both high calorie food and highly potent sexual stimuli affect the brain with blasts of dopamine that have been described as "drug-like" suggest that both offered highly valued rewards...from our genes' perspective. One can argue as to what constitutes "highly potent," especially as different people react differently to different things. An erotic experience may be more dopamine-producing to one person than to another. Every orgasm apparently kicks in some version of the dopamine roller coaster, but lots in a row, or particularly intense stimulation (perhaps because some erotic activity is perceived as "risky" or "shocking") apparently trigger more extreme dopamine fluctuations, on average. More on that in future posts.

We are pair-bonding mammals (though not sexually exclusive), *and* we do also have genetically inspired inclinations to add additional partners. There is a tension between these two inclinations, which results in a large array of cultural and individual choices. Both of these tendencies thus serve our genes. In future posts I'll share what I think will let us steer around the later, should we want to strengthen our pair-bonds.

Please do not assume that I am assigning values to anyone's choices. I agree that we are set up for a wide variety of behaviors, which have, no doubt, been adaptive at different points of history.

I'm a big fan of free will. That is why I'm daring to point out that too much sexual satiation actually can interfere with free will...and even cause break ups that we wouldn't have otherwise have chosen. Our genes want variety, and they molded us when today's overwhelming sexual variety was not the reality. Keep in mind that nothing like today's Internet porn, TV and ads have been in place at any time in history. The closest parallel would have been the odd harem, or its cultural equivalent elsewhere - definitely not the experience of the masses. Most of our ancestors spent their entire lives in the company of a small band or two.

I know my suggestions are anathema to many. I think that in future posts I will be able to show that a better understanding of the effects of orgasm, and especially sexual satiety, on the brain suggest that it is time to reconsider the some of the beliefs we have codified in the last half century. I would be surprised indeed if everyone instantly agreed with me. ;-)

I look forward to reading more about the Coolidge effect and especially about ways of dealing with our predisposed inclination to always look for a new mate. I have read much on EP's take on sex. It is very enlightening; coupled with your discussion on brain chemistry, it goes even deeper. My question is: Have you heard about the taoists' believe in male conservation of ejaculation? What effect, if any, would male orgasm denial have on a male's brain chemistry? Would it be a way to avoid the post orgasmic satiety problem and therefore also the Coolidge effect? The female orgasm was prized, of course, and they would probably still feel the Coolidge effect. Are the male and female reactions to orgasm the same?
Thanks again, I look forward to reading more, including your book.

Excellent questions. My first explorations of the benefits of making love without orgasm were made due to a book on Daoist lovemaking. I could see the improvements in my partner's outlook immediately, but it was years before I realized that my orgasms had unfortunate effects on my outlook, too. More recently, I have learned that even ancient Daoists recognized that orgasm was not beneficial for women. Then, at some point, the theory arose that if one avoids orgasm while one's partner orgasms, one "steals" the sexual energy given off by the orgasming partner. I think this nonsense accounts, in part, for the literature that "prizes" female orgasm. Also, orgasm always feels great, so the assumption is that it must be good for us. I certainly made that assumption! It would be a sound assumption if the cycle of orgasm were actually as short and purely physical as the observations of Masters & Johnson. In fact, there's growing evidence that the neurochemical cycle after orgasm is far longer, with the power to create unwelcome mood swings. (I'll post more on what is known about this cycle.)

Also, men who experienced this "flatness" after climax quite logically imagined that semen loss was the source of any feelings of "depletion", when, in fact, changes in brain chemistry after orgasm - especially low dopamine - are the cause. This hidden neurochemical cycle affects both sexes, although slightly differently on average. However, I've talked to women who immediately shut down emotionally after orgasm, and men who stay especially loving for a bit, so there may be a good deal of overlap between the sexes. In my case, my husband notices the effects more in the first week, while I tend to notice them more in the second week. Most people would never become aware of this hidden cycle unless they experiment with the alternative for several weeks...and then return to sex with orgasm.

It's all fascinating, as are its links to the Coolidge Effect, and it would be nice to know more. However, for the moment, psychologists on two continents say they can't study this subject because ethics committees would forbid it. As a culture, we have codified the idea that sex without orgasm is always a paraphilia. I don't doubt that it *can* be engaged in for unhealthy reasons, but I no longer doubt that couples can choose it for quite healthy reasons. The Daoists weren't the only ones who figured this out by the way. Over and over, humanity has stumbled upon the same insight. It seems that the best approaches are also the gentlest, unlike some of the more forceful Daoist techniques, which could put too much stress on the prostate. More soon.