- Home
- Medical news & Guidelines
- Anesthesiology
- Cardiology and CTVS
- Critical Care
- Dentistry
- Dermatology
- Diabetes and Endocrinology
- ENT
- Gastroenterology
- Medicine
- Nephrology
- Neurology
- Obstretics-Gynaecology
- Oncology
- Ophthalmology
- Orthopaedics
- Pediatrics-Neonatology
- Psychiatry
- Pulmonology
- Radiology
- Surgery
- Urology
- Laboratory Medicine
- Diet
- Nursing
- Paramedical
- Physiotherapy
- Health news
- Fact Check
- Bone Health Fact Check
- Brain Health Fact Check
- Cancer Related Fact Check
- Child Care Fact Check
- Dental and oral health fact check
- Diabetes and metabolic health fact check
- Diet and Nutrition Fact Check
- Eye and ENT Care Fact Check
- Fitness fact check
- Gut health fact check
- Heart health fact check
- Kidney health fact check
- Medical education fact check
- Men's health fact check
- Respiratory fact check
- Skin and hair care fact check
- Vaccine and Immunization fact check
- Women's health fact check
- AYUSH
- State News
- Andaman and Nicobar Islands
- Andhra Pradesh
- Arunachal Pradesh
- Assam
- Bihar
- Chandigarh
- Chattisgarh
- Dadra and Nagar Haveli
- Daman and Diu
- Delhi
- Goa
- Gujarat
- Haryana
- Himachal Pradesh
- Jammu & Kashmir
- Jharkhand
- Karnataka
- Kerala
- Ladakh
- Lakshadweep
- Madhya Pradesh
- Maharashtra
- Manipur
- Meghalaya
- Mizoram
- Nagaland
- Odisha
- Puducherry
- Punjab
- Rajasthan
- Sikkim
- Tamil Nadu
- Telangana
- Tripura
- Uttar Pradesh
- Uttrakhand
- West Bengal
- Medical Education
- Industry
Study Reveals Sexually Dimorphic Brain Processing in Individuals with Low Sexual Desire
UK: Understanding the complex interplay between biology and psychology in the realm of sexual desire has long been a subject of fascination and inquiry. A recent study has delved into this intriguing area, shedding light on the sexually dimorphic brain processing observed in men and women experiencing distressing low sexual desire.
The study published in Scientific Reports showed that women and men with hypoactive sexual desire disorder (HSDD) -- that is, "distressingly" low sexual desire -- demonstrated dimorphic brain processing on functional MRI (fMRI).
"The data supports the ‘top-down’ theory of HSDD in women, whereas in men HSDD appears to be associated with different neurofunctional processes," the researchers wrote. In women, the ‘top-down’ theory of HSDD describes hyperactivity in higher-level cognitive brain regions, suppressing lower-level emotional/sexual brain areas.
The researchers note that therapies targeted at reducing hyperactivity in higher-cortical regions or boosting activation in lower-limbic regions could improve sexual function in HSDD women. However, there may be a different HSDD model in men, whereby the visual attention to the sexual cues is not relayed effectively to emotional centers involved in the sexual response.
HSDD is the most frequent sexual health complaint, affecting 8% of men and 10% of women. Previous research has found that in women the condition is caused by overactivity in higher-level cognitive brain regions that regulate self-monitoring, introspection, and guilt feelings, which in turn suppress lower-level emotional/sexual brain areas that regulate reward, emotion, and sexual processing. There is no clarity on whether this mechanism is at work in men.
It is essential to directly compare the neurobiological basis of HSDD in both sexes for further understanding of the disorder, which could lead to targeted and effective interventions and treatments. Considering this, Alexander N. Comninos, Section of Endocrinology and Investigative Medicine, Imperial College London, London, UK, and colleagues employed task-based functional MRI in 32 men and 32 women with HSDD to measure sexual-brain processing during sexual versus non-sexual videos, and psychometric questionnaires to evaluate sexual desire/arousal.
The study led to the following findings:
- Women had greater activation in higher-level and lower-level brain regions, compared to men.
- Indeed, women who had greater hypothalamic activation in response to sexual videos reported higher psychometric scores in the motivational (r = 0.56), evaluative (r = 0.55), and physiological (r = 0.57) domains of sexual desire and arousal after watching the sexual videos in the scanner.
- There were no similar correlations in men.
"Taken together, this is the first direct comparison of the neural correlates of distressing low sexual desire between men and women," the researchers wrote.
"The data supports the ‘top-down’ theory of HSDD in women, whereas HSDD, in men, appears to be associated with different neurofunctional processes," they concluded.
Reference:
Ertl, N., Mills, E. G., Wall, M. B., Thurston, L., Yang, L., Suladze, S., Hunjan, T., Phylactou, M., Patel, B., Bassett, P. A., Howard, J., Rabiner, E. A., Abbara, A., Goldmeier, D., Comninos, A. N., & Dhillo, W. S. (2024). Women and men with distressing low sexual desire exhibit sexually dimorphic brain processing. Scientific Reports, 14(1), 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-61190-4
MSc. Biotechnology
Medha Baranwal joined Medical Dialogues as an Editor in 2018 for Speciality Medical Dialogues. She covers several medical specialties including Cardiac Sciences, Dentistry, Diabetes and Endo, Diagnostics, ENT, Gastroenterology, Neurosciences, and Radiology. She has completed her Bachelors in Biomedical Sciences from DU and then pursued Masters in Biotechnology from Amity University. She has a working experience of 5 years in the field of medical research writing, scientific writing, content writing, and content management. She can be contacted at  editorial@medicaldialogues.in. Contact no. 011-43720751
Dr Kamal Kant Kohli-MBBS, DTCD- a chest specialist with more than 30 years of practice and a flair for writing clinical articles, Dr Kamal Kant Kohli joined Medical Dialogues as a Chief Editor of Medical News. Besides writing articles, as an editor, he proofreads and verifies all the medical content published on Medical Dialogues including those coming from journals, studies,medical conferences,guidelines etc. Email: drkohli@medicaldialogues.in. Contact no. 011-43720751