But more recent evidence reveals that differences between the sexes may actually be more nuanced or even non-existent, depending on how you define and attempt to measure desire. For decades, researchers bought into society’s belief that men have higher desire than women, since large studies consistently confirmed that finding.
We’re also coming to realise that male and female desire might not be as dissimilar as we’ve typically assumed. As Beverly Whipple, a professor at Rutgers University, says: “Every woman wants something different.” Now, scientists are increasingly beginning to realise that female desire cannot be summarised in terms of a single experience: it varies both between women and within individuals, and it spans a highly diverse spectrum of manifestations. Still, we’ve come a long way from past notions on the subject, which ran the gamut of women being insatiable, sex-hungry nymphomaniacs to having no desire at all.
But despite decades spent trying to crack this riddle, researchers have yet to land on a unified definition of female desire, let alone come close to fully understanding how it works.
It has been at the centre of numerous books, articles and blog posts, and no doubt the cause of countless agonised ponderings by men and women alike. What do women want? It’s a question that’s stymied the likes of Sigmund Freud to Mel Gibson.