Watching pornography an intensive task? Not for our visual brain area. New research shows that watching erotic movies causes relaxation in the part of the brain that processes visual stimuli.
Usually when watching movies – or doing any another visual task – extra blood flows to the visual brain area. But a recent study shows that in case of erotic films the brain seems to shunt blood – and therefore energy – elsewhere, perhaps to regions of the brain responsible for sexual arousal.
A research team from the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, scanned the primary visual cortex of 12 heterosexual women. All women were on hormonal contraception, which smoothed out any changes in sexual desire or arousal related to their menstrual cycles. They watched three videos while the scans were made. One of the videos was a documentary about marine life. The other two were “woman friendly” pornographic films. One video showed only foreplay and masturbation, while the other – more explicit – erotic film included scenes of oral sex and vaginal intercourse.
The results of the scans showed that the more intense erotic video resulted in far less blood being sent to the primary visual cortex. Usually, this effect is only seen when people are asked to perform a non visual task, such as remembering words, during visual stimulation.
According to researcher Gert Holstege, the results suggest the brain was focusing more on sexual excitement than visual processing during the erotic film. “You have to realize that the brain wants to spare as much energy as possible, so if some part of the brain is not necessary at a high level of functioning, it immediately goes down,” says Holstege.
“If you look at your computer, for example, and you have to write something, then you have to give specific and careful attention at what you’re doing because if you don’t, it means you make mistakes,” explains Holstege. “But the moment you are watching pornography that’s not necessary, because you know exactly what’s going on. It’s not important that the door is green or yellow.”
Source: newslog, Live Science
Photo: jlndrr / Flickr
Huynh, H., Beers, C., Willemsen, A., Lont, E., Laan, E., Dierckx, R., Jansen, M., Sand, M., Weijmar Schultz, W., & Holstege, G. (2012). High-intensity Erotic Visual Stimuli De-activate the Primary Visual Cortex in Women The Journal of Sexual Medicine DOI: 10.1111/j.1743-6109.2012.02706.x
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