Orgasm or sexual climax is the sudden release of accumulated sexual excitement during the sexual response cycle.
It is characterized by intense sexual pleasure resulting in rhythmic, involuntary muscular contractions in the pelvic region.
Orgasms are controlled by the involuntary or autonomic nervous system.
Orgasms are experienced by both males and females; the body’s response includes muscular spasms, a general euphoric sensation, and, frequently, body movements and vocalizations.
The period after orgasm is typically a relaxing experience, after the release of the neurohormones oxytocin and prolactin, and endorphins.
Human orgasms usually result from physical sexual stimulation of the penis in males and of the clitoris, and vagina, in females.
Sexual stimulation can be by masturbation, or with a sexual partner, penetrative sex, non-penetrative sex, or other sexual activity.
Physical stimulation is not requisite for orgasm, though, as possibilities exist to reach orgasm through psychological means alone.
Getting to orgasm may be difficult without a suitable psychological state.
A sex dream can trigger an orgasm and the release of sexual fluids.
Physiological responses during sexual activity, include a relaxed state created by prolactin, as well as changes in the central nervous system, such as a temporary decrease in the metabolic activity of large parts of the cerebral cortex while there is no change or increased metabolic activity in the limbic areas of the brain.
Physiological responses during sexual activity are affected by cultural views of orgasm, such as the beliefs that orgasm is either important or irrelevant for satisfaction in a sexual relationship, and theories about the biological and evolutionary functions of orgasm.
Sexual dysfunctions involving orgasm occurs as anorgasmia.
Orgasm is usually defined strictly by the muscular contractions involved during sexual activity, along with the characteristic patterns of change in heart rate, blood pressure, and often respiration rate and depth.
This is categorized as the sudden discharge of accumulated sexual tension during the sexual response cycle, resulting in rhythmic muscular contractions in the pelvic region.
The clinical definition of organ ism include physiological, psychological, endocrinological, and neurological aspects of orgasm.
Sensations are extremely pleasurable and often felt throughout the body.
Orgasms can be achieved during a variety of activities: vaginal, anal, oral, manual, non-penetrative sex, or masturbation.
They may also be achieved by the use of a sex toy, such as a vibrator, or an erotic electrostimulation.
Achieving orgasm by stimulation of the nipples or other erogenous zones is rarer.
Multiple orgasms that occur within a short period of one another are also possible, especially in women, but they are also uncommon.
In addition to physical stimulation, orgasm can be achieved from psychological arousal alone, such as during dreaming (nocturnal emission) or by forced orgasm.
Sexual function and sexuality after spinal cord injury are very often impacted, yet this injury does not deprive one of the sexual feelings such as sexual arousal and erotic desires.
In women, the most common way to achieve orgasm is by direct sexual stimulation of the clitoris withconsistent digital, oral, or other frictions against the external parts of the clitoris.
General statistics indicate that 70–80 percent of women require direct clitoral stimulation to achieve orgasm.
Indirect clitoral stimulation via vaginal penetration may also be sufficient.
Orgasms vary in intensity, and women vary in the frequency of their orgasms and the amount of stimulation necessary to trigger an orgasm.
Clitoral orgasms are easier to achieve because the glans of the clitoris, or clitoris as a whole, has more than 8,000 sensory nerve endings.
It has as many nerve endings as are present in the human penis or glans penis.
As the clitoris is the equivalent in its capacity to receive sexual stimulation as the penis.
There are areas in the anterior vaginal wall and between the top junction of the labia minora and the urethra that are especially sensitive.
The area commonly described as the G-spot may produce an orgasm, and the urethral sponge, an area in which the G-spot may be found, runs along the roof of the vagina.
The G-spot and can create pleasurable sensations when stimulated, with intense sexual pleasure including orgasm from vaginal stimulation.
The vagina has significantly fewer nerve endings than the clitoris.
The greatest concentration of vaginal nerve endings are at the lower third, near the entrance of the vagina.
Only one part of the clitoris, the urethral sponge, is in contact with the penis, fingers, or a dildo in the vagina.
The tip of the clitoris and the inner lips, which are also very sensitive, are not receiving direct stimulation during penetrative intercourse.[
Some couples may engage in the woman on top position or the coital alignment technique to maximize clitoral stimulation.
For some women, the clitoris is very sensitive after climax, making additional stimulation initially painful.
Masters and Johnson argue that all women are potentially multiply orgasmic, but that multiply orgasmic men are rare.
Female is capable of rapid return to orgasm immediately following an orgasmic experience, if re-stimulated before tensions have dropped below plateau phase response levels.
Some sources state that both men and women experience a refractory period because women may also experience a period after orgasm in which further sexual stimulation does not produce excitement.
After the initial orgasm, subsequent orgasms for women may be stronger or more pleasurable as the stimulation accumulates.
The special sensitivity of the lower anterior vaginal wall could be explained by pressure and movement of clitoris’s root during a vaginal penetration and subsequent perineal contraction.
Anorgasmia, is the regular difficulty reaching orgasm after ample sexual stimulation, is significantly more common in women than in men.
In addition to sexual dysfunction being a cause for anorgasmia, the amount of time for sexual arousal needed to reach orgasm being variable and longer in women than in men, other factors include a lack of communication between sexual partners about what is needed for the woman to reach orgasm, feelings of sexual inadequacy in either partner, a focus on only penetration, and men generalizing women’s trigger for orgasm based on their own sexual experiences with other women.
Because women reach orgasm through intercourse less consistently than men.
Women are more likely than men to have faked an orgasm.
Ian Kerner stated, women reach orgasm about 25 percent of the time with intercourse, compared with 81 percent of the time during oral sex.
Men had an orgasm in 95 percent of sexual encounters and women in 69 percent.
The more sexual practices are engaged in, the higher a woman’s chance of having an orgasm.
Women were more likely to reach orgasm in encounters including cunnilingus.
Studies suggest that women exposed to lower levels of prenatal androgens are more likely to experience orgasm during vaginal intercourse than other women.
Exercise could bring about sexual pleasure, including orgasm: aerobic or isotonic exercise that resembles sexual activity or sexual positions can induce sexual pleasure, including orgasm.
The relationship between pelvic floor dysfunction and sexual problems in men and women are commonly linked and suggested that physical therapy strengthening the pelvic floor could help address the sexual problems
Coregasm refers to exercise-induced orgasm or exercise-induced sexual pleasure.
In men, the most common way of achieving orgasm is by physical sexual stimulation of the penis, it is usually accompanied by ejaculation
It is possible, rarely, for men to orgasm without ejaculation, known as a “dry orgasm”.
Prepubescent boys have dry orgasms, and they can also occur as a result of retrograde ejaculation, or hypogonadism.
Men may also ejaculate without reaching orgasm, and is known as anorgasmic ejaculation.
Men also achieve orgasm by stimulation of the prostate.
Two stages to male orgasm: emission accompanying orgasm, almost instantly followed by a refractory period.
The refractory period is the recovery phase after orgasm during which it is physiologically impossible for a man to have additional orgasms.
It is suggested that in the first stage of male orgasm accessory organs contract and the male can feel the ejaculation coming; two to three seconds later the ejaculation occurs, which the man cannot delay, or control.
In the second stage, the male feels pleasurable contractions during ejaculation, reporting greater pleasure tied to a greater volume of ejaculate.
For the male the resolution phase includes a superimposed refractory period.
Below the age of 30, but relatively few thereafter, have the ability to ejaculate frequently and are subject to only very short refractory periods during the resolution phase.
It is rare for men to achieve multiple orgasms, but some men have reported having multiple, consecutive orgasms, particularly without ejaculation.
Multiple orgasms are more commonly reported in very young men than in older men.
In younger men, the refractory period may only last a few minutes, but last more than an hour in older men.
The increased infusion of the hormone oxytocin during ejaculation is believed to be chiefly responsible for the refractory period.
The amount by which oxytocin is increased may affect the length of each refractory period.
In both sexes, pleasure can be derived from the nerve endings around the anus and the anus itself, such as during anal sex.
Men can achieve orgasms through prostate stimulation alone.
The prostate is the male variation to the Skene’s glands believed to be connected to the female G-spot).
The prostate can be sexually stimulated through anal sex, perineum massage or a vibrator.
It is suggested prostate-induced orgasms occur via stimulation of nerves in the prostatic plexus surrounding the organ, while others suggest it is via nerves within the prostate itself, and others say changes in the brain are required to derive pleasure from prostate stimulation.
Prostate-induced orgasms can produce a deeper orgasm, described by some men as more widespread and intense, longer-lasting, and allowing for greater feelings of ecstasy than orgasm elicited by penile stimulation only.
Pegging, consisting of a woman penetrating a man’s anus with a strap-on dildo, stimulates the prostate, although typically men to not reach orgasm as a receptive partner solely from anal sex.
For women, penile-anal penetration may also indirectly stimulate the clitoris related to shared sensory nerves, especially the pudendal nerve, which gives off the inferior anal nerves and divides into the perineal nerve and the dorsal nerve of the clitoris.
The G-spot area, considered to be interconnected with the clitoris, may also be indirectly stimulated during anal sex.
The anus has many nerve endings, but their purpose is not specifically for inducing orgasm, and so a woman achieving orgasm solely by anal stimulation is rare.
The stimulation of the clitoris, a G-spot area, or both, while engaging in anal sex can help some women enjoy the activity and reach orgasm during it.
Anal orgasms derived from anal penetration are the result of the relationship between the nerves of the anus, rectum, clitoris or G-spot area in women, and the anus’s proximity to the prostate and relationship between the anal and rectal nerves in men, rather than orgasms originating from the anus itself.
Simulation of the breast area during sexual intercourse or foreplay, or solely having the breasts fondled, can create mild to intense orgasms, sometimes referred to as a breast orgasm or nipple orgasm.
Few women report experiencing orgasm from nipple stimulation.
Nipple sensation travels to the same part of the brain as sensations from the vagina, clitoris and cervix, and that these reported orgasms are genital orgasms caused by nipple stimulation, and may be directly linked to the genital sensory cortex.
The hormone oxytocin, which is produced in the body during sexual excitement and arousal, and labor is believed to cause orgasm.
Oxytocin is produced when a man or woman’s nipples are stimulated and become erect, suggesting that nipple nerves may directly link up with the relevant parts of the brain without uterine mediation, acknowledging that men show the same pattern of nipple stimulation activating genital brain regions.
Emotions of anxiety, defensiveness, and the failure of communication can interfere with desire and orgasm.
A woman’s orgasm may, in some cases, last a little longer than a man’s.
Women’s orgasms have been estimated to last, on average, approximately 20 seconds, and to consist of a series of muscular contractions in the pelvic area that includes the vagina, the uterus, and the anus.
In some cases, the woman reports having an orgasm, but no pelvic contractions are measured
Women’s orgasms are preceded by the erection of the clitoris and moistening of the opening of the vagina.
Some women exhibit a sex flush, a reddening of the skin over much of the body due to increased blood flow to the skin.
As a woman nears orgasm, the clitoral glans retracts and the labia minora become darker.
As orgasm becomes imminent, the outer third of the vagina narrows, while overall the vagina lengthens and dilates and also becomes congested from engorged soft tissue.
As orgasm becomes imminent myofibroblasts of the nipple-areolar complex contract, causing erection of the nipples and contraction of the areolar diameter, reaching their maximum at the start of orgasm.
A woman experiences full orgasm when the uterus, vagina, anus, and pelvic muscles undergo a series of rhythmic contractions, while most women find these contractions very pleasurable.
There is a strong correllation with the subjective experience that orgasm ultimately is and the state that the measure of contractions that occur at a frequency of 8–13 Hz is specific to orgasm.
As a man nears orgasm during stimulation of the penis, there is an intense and highly pleasurable pulsating sensation of neuromuscular euphoria.
Such pulsating sensations originate from the contractions of pelvic floor muscles that begin in the anal sphincter and travel to the tip of the penis, described as a tingling sensation.
The pulsating sensations eventually increase in speed and intensity as the orgasm approachesthe orgasmic pleasure is sustained for several seconds.
During male orgasm there are rapid, rhythmic pulsating sensation contractions of the anal sphincter, the prostate, and the bulbospongiosus muscles of the penis.
During male orgasm sperm are transmitted up the vasa deferentia from the testicles, into the prostate gland as well as through the seminal vesicles to produce semen.
The prostate produces a secretion that forms one of the components of ejaculate.
Contraction of the sphincter and prostate force stored semen to be expelled through the penis’s urethral opening: this process takes from three to ten seconds and produces a pleasurable feeling.
Ejaculation may continue for a few seconds after the euphoric sensation gradually tapers off.
Changes in brain activity in both sexes, as regions associated with behavioral control, fear, and anxiety shut down during orgasm.
The emotional centers of a man’s brain also become deactivated during orgasm but to a lesser extent than in women.
Brain scans of both sexes have shown that the pleasure centers of a man’s brain show more intense activity than in women during orgasm.
Male and female brains demonstrate brain scans showing a temporary decrease in the metabolic activity of large parts of the cerebral cortex with normal or increased metabolic activity in the limbic areas of the brain.
The existence of EEG changes specifically related to sexual arousal and orgasm remain unproven.
Orgasm, and sexual activity as a whole, are physical activities that can require exertion of many major bodily systems.
Studies show men who had fewer orgasms were twice as likely to die of any cause as those having two or more orgasms a week: follow-up in focused more specifically on cardiovascular health found that having sex three or more times a week was associated with a 50 percent reduction in the risk of heart attack or stroke.
A small percentage of men have a disease called postorgasmic illness syndrome (POIS), which causes severe muscle pain throughout the body and other symptoms immediately following ejaculation.
The inability to have an orgasm, or regular difficulty reaching orgasm after ample sexual stimulation, is called anorgasmia or inorgasmia.
A male that experiences erection and ejaculation but no orgasm, is said to have sexual or ejactulatory anhedonia, a condition in which an individual cannot feel pleasure from an orgasm.
Anorgasmia is significantly more common in women than in men, which has been attributed to the lack of sex education about women’s bodies, especially in sex-negative cultures, such as clitoral stimulation usually being key for women to orgasm.
Approximately 25 percent of women report difficulties with orgasm, 10% of women have never had an orgasm, and 40 percent or 40–50 percent have either complained about sexual dissatisfaction or experienced difficulty becoming sexually aroused at some point in their lives.
Researchers found 75 percent of men and 29 percent of women always had orgasms with their spouse, while 40 percent of men and 80 percent of women thought their spouse always orgasmed during sex.
These rates differ in non-marital straight relationships with rates increasing to 81 percent for men and 43 percent for women orgasming during sex with their short-term partners, and 69 percent for men and 83 percent for women thinking their short-term partners always orgasmed.
Women are much more likely to be nearly always or always orgasmic when alone than with a partner.
62 percent of women in a partnered relationship said they were satisfied with the frequency/consistency of their orgasms.
Additionally, some women express that their most satisfying sexual experiences entail being connected to someone, rather than solely basing satisfaction on orgasm.
Sexual Behavior in the Human Female showed that, over the previous five years of sexual activity, 78 percent of women had orgasms in 60 percent to 100 percent of sexual encounters with other women, compared with 55 percent for heterosexual sex.
] Kinsey attributed this difference to female partners knowing more about women’s sexuality and how to optimize women’s sexual satisfaction than male partners do.
Lesbians have orgasms more often and more easily in sexual interactions than heterosexual women do, and that female partners are more likely to emphasize the emotional aspects of lovemaking.
In contrast, other researches have found that women in same-sex relationships enjoyed identical sexual desire, sexual communication, sexual satisfaction, and satisfaction with orgasm as their heterosexual counterparts.
Anorgasmia may be attributed to an inability to relax, and may be associated with performance pressure and an unwillingness to pursue pleasure, as separate from the other person’s satisfaction.
Women worry so much about the pleasure of their partner that they become anxious, which manifests as impatience with the delay of orgasm for them: This delay can lead to frustration of not reaching orgasmic sexual satisfaction.
Although orgasm dysfunction can have psychological components, physiological factors often play a role.
For instance, delayed orgasm or the inability to achieve orgasm is a common side effect of many medications.
Menopause involves loss of hormones supporting sexuality and genital functionality.
Vaginal and clitoral atrophy and dryness affect up to 50–60 percent of postmenopausal women.
Testosterone levels in men fall as they age.
Sexual dysfunction overall becomes more likely with poor physical and emotional health.
Negative experiences in sexual relationships and overall well-being are associated with sexual dysfunction.
Women tend to reach orgasm more easily when they are ovulating.
The occurrence and timing of orgasms are all a part of the female body’s unconscious strategy to collect and retain sperm from more evolutionary fit men.
A theory suggests that an orgasm during intercourse functions as a bypass button to a woman’s natural cervical filter against sperm and pathogens, and that an orgasm before functions to strengthen the filter.
Most female orgasms emanate from a clitoral, rather than vaginal site.
The variation in the ability to orgasm, is generally thought to be psychosocial, but has been found to be 34 percent to 45 percent genetic.