SAN DIEGO, Ca. (CBS Sacramento) – According to a recent study, women may enjoy a spicier sex life after they receive breast implants.
Although the study size was small, researchers found that women experienced a significant boost in their arousal and sexual satisfaction after they had the surgery.
However, researchers also found that women who were left with stretch marks after the procedure did not experience any improvement in their sex life.
“I think that the female breast is a very important part of a woman’s body, in terms of how a woman feels about herself in public, how her clothes fit and how she feels about herself sexually,” Dr. David Reath, chair of the public education committee of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons told HealthDay News. “It’s very common for a woman post-surgery to say she feels more confident, that her outward body now fits her inward persona.”
Tomi-Ann Roberts, a member of the American Psychological Association’s task force and a professor of psychology at Colorado College thinks there could be other reasons why women report enhanced sex life afterwards.
“When we have exerted a great effort, spent a great deal of money and effort and time on something, we tend to justify that effort,” she said. “Our good feeling is increased because of the effort, not the thing itself.”
The study involved 45 women who planned on undergoing the surgery.
Researchers then asked the women to fill out a questionnaire before they had the surgery that assessed their sexual desire, arousal and sexual satisfaction. Patients were then asked to fill out the questionnaire again at four and 18 months after the surgery.
The 36 who did not develop stretch marks said they had experienced improvements in their levels of arousal and felt they had better sex lives. The 36 reported the same improvements 4 months later and again 18 months later.
“They found that in the areas of both sexual satisfaction and sexual arousal, there were significantly increased feelings,” Reath said. “These aspects of the sexual experience were increased for those women.”
Out of the nine women that did develop stretch marks, none reported any improvement with their sex lives. According to the ASPS a stretch mark can occur when the implant is significantly larger than the original breast.
Reath was not surprised by the results. “When I see patients and follow up, a lot of them will say ‘My husband and I or my boyfriend and I are having a lot of fun,’ Why not? It’s an important part of life,” he went on to say.
Roberts suggested the results may be driven more by social pressures than the surgery itself. “Here are 45 women who spent a great deal of time and money and effort augmenting their breasts because the media has clearly convinced them their breasts are inadequate, so we shouldn’t be surprised they are pleased with the breast augmentation.” She went on to say. “We further shouldn’t be surprised that they are pleased in the arena of their sexuality,” Roberts continued. “Feminine heterosexuality is very much about our sense of whether or not we are pleasing our partner, and here we have 45 women who have spent a great deal of money to that purpose. If these breasts are now pleasing to their male partner, then they are likely to feel more sexually attractive.”
Roberts felt that this study should have had more practical questions such as ‘did the implant impact your ability to breast feed?’ or ‘do you experience any discomfort while jogging?’
“There are a lot of other things breasts are a part of,” she went on to say. “This is an indication that in our Victoria’s Secret culture, breasts are for men. They are for men’s pleasure.”
The researchers will present their findings at the ASPS annual meeting this week in San Diego. The findings have not been published.
