When we said never measured, never improved we meant it. Sexperiments are designed to help you find what does (and doesn't) influence your orgasms and arousal. Every month, Lioness users will come together to try and see if their orgasms data changes based on specific techniques, tools, and lifestyle changes.
In other words, we're inviting you to take part in spicy science projects for adults.
In the spirit of all things spooky, Lioness users spent the month of October experimenting with pleasures they couldn’t see.
Here’s what the data says about blindfolds and orgasms:
For the first time ever, we had a tie! With only 14% of users reporting they never masturbate with their eyes open, the remaining 86% was equally divided between "Often” and "Sometimes.”
Lioness users were given the same three choices for this hypothesis as they always are: Get Better, Stay the Same, or Get Worse.
Here’s how they voted, with 55% of users predicting their O’s would Stay the Same:
Fun Fact: 5 out of the 7 sexperiments we’ve done so far have seen an overwhelming majority of folks hypothesizing their arousal won’t change. CBD and Edging have been the only experiments thus far where users thought their orgasms would improve. But in all seven experiments, data showed some element of improvement for arousal and orgasm — whether it was orgasm length, peak force, or star rating.
Lioness sessions tagged as "blindfolded” yielded some interesting results! Here’s what we found:
In a surprising turn of events for over half of Lioness Sexperimenters, blindfolds definitely improved orgasms and arousal from a data perspective. More time spent masturbating and stronger force during orgasm are just two indicators that perhaps there’s merit in covering your eyes during masturbation and sex.
Each month, Lioness users who participate in Sexperiments get access to full global data results AND their own personalized insights from their own sessions.
As a sex educator, I’m in a lot of online, sex positive forums and spaces. After all, these are the places people are asking the most important questions related to sex (not to mention sex is pretty much my favorite topic in the whole wide world).
One topic that comes up quite often is the topic of porn. It seems the internet is really divided on the subject and cannot agree if it’s normal, if it’s cheating, if it’s ethical, and more.
So join me as I get into the world of pornography and some definitive answers to your burning questions!
Yes! Not only is it normal to watch porn, but it’s normal to read it, to listen to it, and to even make your own. (You didn’t really think taking nudes was anything other than DIY porn, did you?)
We’ll get a bit more into what each of those encompass, but the bottom line is this: pornography is a normal and common sexual tool. It’s arousing, it’s enticing, and it’s indulgent. So if it gets you off, let yourself enjoy it.
The most important thing you can do as a pornography user is make sure you’re consuming ethical porn. And before you roll your eyes, hear me out.
The truth is that not all porn is created equally. Here are some ways to gauge whether what you’re consuming is ethical based on the type of content you’re consuming:
There are three types of porn you can consume if you want to give naughty content a try:
Absolutely! If there’s anything you learn from reading our Sex Guides, let it be this: sexual arousal, orgasm, and pleasure are unique to each of us. The ways in which we engage ourselves sexually are vast, and there’s no one thing that's going to work for all of us.
Porn is not immune to this truth. Some people are going to watch porn and be wholly unaroused, while others may hear it and be turned off or read it and have trouble engaging in it at all. Whether you’re aroused or unaffected by exposure to porn, it’s generally a normal reaction either way.
No, porn isn’t just for men. But if you’re a woman and you think porn is just for men —or if just hearing the word alone feels off putting —you’re not alone. So much of mainstream porn is geared towards cis-het men, that many people with vulvas often fall into accepting that it’s simply not for them or find that it’s not very arousing when they do go in search of it.
This experience is so prevalent, in fact, that an entire genre of porn was created to make porn feel more accessible —pornography for women.
On some sites, this means more romance and kissing. For others, this means intentionally representing various body types and relationships. All of it, however, tends to decenter male pleasure (unless you’re into that) and emphasizes female pleasure and female agency. (We are big fans of platforms like Afterglow and Dipsea, if you’re looking for suggestions. Both do a wonderful job creating erotic content for people without penises and queer people.)
This is a great question to ask — and a really common one. Fortunately, the answer is no, you’re not going to get clinically addicted to porn.
But wait! You read that story about that woman on Facebook having no sex life because her partner wouldn’t stop watching porn — like, he was doing it when he was driving, right? Surely that’s a thing that happens to people?
Well, yes and no. More often than not, the problems associated with using pornography are better described as one of two things:
Regardless of compulsive pornography use or moral incongruence, however, porn addiction remains too heavily debated to be considered a legitimate reason not to at least try porn. (And if you are still concerned and have a trusted therapist or doctor to discuss your concerns with, talking to them first may help you make the choice as well —just remember this opens up the door for their own biases to influence their advice.)
First of all, get excited! Porn is a really hot, fun, and accessible sexual tool that you are allowed to explore with enthusiasm.
When you’re ready to really give porn a try, think about the type of sex you like having, or the type of sex you wish you could have and seek it out. Whether you’re listening to your porn, watching it, or reading it, starting with things that you already know turn you on can make it easy to settle into the fantasy you’re engaging in.
At worst, you’ll find that pornography just doesn’t work for you. At best, however, you’ll open up a world of exploring sexual fantasies and kinks that you may not have found otherwise, taking your pleasure to new heights.
There’s an internet rumor that says caffeine makes orgasms 50% stronger —and the Lioness pride put it to the test during the month of September.
Grab a cup of joe and dive into the data with us!
This month, Sexperimenters were prompted with a simple poll:do you drink caffeine before flicking the bean?And their answers suggest caffeine is not being used as much of an aphrodisiac, with only 16.1% of participants saying they consume it often before masturbating.
Lioness users were given three choices for this hypothesis: Get Better, Stay the Same, or Get Worse.
Here’s how they voted, with only 34% predicting their O’s would get better:
The results of this Sexperiment are pretty fun because “better” is truly in the eye of the beholder with these ones.
While Lioness users rated their caffeine orgasms at 3.6 stars out of 5, the time to orgasm dropped significantly! Average latency during baseline sessions was 5 minutes 44 seconds, whereas average latency during caffeinated masturbation was 2 minutes 45 seconds!
This Sexperiment also gave the following results:
If you’re looking to get in, get off, and get out of your masturbation sessions quickly, caffeine seems to be a good way to do it. If staying a while and taking your time are your thing, however, skip the caffeine.
Ready to join Sexperiments? Get your Lioness and join us in October when we’ll be blindfolding ourselves for science. Will removing sight improve our orgasms? We’re determined to find out.
Some people believe the eyes are windows into the soul. Perhaps that’s why eye contact during partnered sex can feel intense, intimate, and vulnerable.
Make no mistake: all five of our senses play a big part in our arousal depending on how we do or do not engage them. And while touch is undoubtedly the most engaged sense in sex and masturbation, sight is a close second.
Let’s get into the science of visual sexual stimulation and what happens when we remove it.
Before we discuss this study, let’s get one thing straight: many sexual studies rely heavily on binary gender and do not include non-binary, gender fluid, or gender queer folks. So when we quote or refer to any study and say “sex” or “men” or “women,” what we mean is natal sex, assigned male at birth (AMAB), and assigned female at birth (AFAB) respectively.
Socially speaking, it’s widely accepted that “men are visual creatures.” We hear this in relation to all types of situations, such as porn consumption, following creators on social media, and checking out attractive strangers during their day to day. Alternatively, people AFAB are generally pigeonholed into being “emotional creatures.” Their sense of sight as it relates to sex and arousal is downplayed, if not entirely erased.
One study conducted in The Journal of Sexual Medicine in 2013 supports these assumptions in part. In order to “explore gender commonalities and differences in neural activity associated with the processing of visual sexual stimuli” the study showed 100 participants (50 AMAB, 50 AFAB) “sexual, neutral, positive, and negative emotional pictures during a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) session”.
What they found was that regardless of sex assigned at birth, there was a clear “distributed network for the neural processing of sexual stimuli”. They concluded, “Apart from the observed gender commonalities, overall stronger responses in men were observed that might indicate stronger sexual responsivity in men.”
At the end of the day, however, this could be a classic case of nature versus nurture. Are people AMAB really more visually stimulated, or have people AFAB just been given less permission to explore that element of their arousal?
One of the most widely used types of visual sexual stimulation is porn. It’s readily accessible on the internet (I mean, duh. Rule 34, right?) and there really is a pot for every lid if you know where to look.
That said, mainstream porn remains heavily centered on cishet male pleasure, which makes finding porn for women intimidating, overwhelming, and often confusing. After all, if the majority of porn available is through the lens of a specific type of pleasure and you’re not enjoying it, it’s easy to wonder if something is wrong with you. (Spoiler alert: there's not.)
Fortunately, Rule 34 really does reign supreme which means porn for women is out there — and it’s good! (Here’s looking at you, Afterglow.)
On the flipside of using visual aids to enhance sexual pleasure lies removing vision entirely for the same purpose. Typically associated with BDSM and power dynamics in the bedroom, blindfolds are incredibly common tools for exploring kink, intimacy, and arousal.
The most widely accepted assumption here is that by inhibiting one sense (sight) the others (especially touch) are heightened. And there are studies that argue this is both true and false with the brain’s neuroplasticity being the main advocate for its ability to adapt and improve other senses in the wake of losing one. But the brain is not designed to instantaneously adapt, so wearing a blindfold during sex and masturbation won’t make any noticeable or lasting changes.
Instead, the novelty and excitement of removing your vision during arousal can heighten your pleasure simply because it is exciting! If you’re masturbating with a blindfold on, it can open the door to increased visualization and fantasy. And if you’re having partnered sex with a blindfold on, the uncertainty of where your partner(s) is coupled with the inability to see what’s going on can really make touch and sound feel so much more pleasurable.
If you’ve been with us for some time now, then you already know what I’m going to say.MAYBE.And there’s only one way to find out.
Removing sight during sex and masturbation has all the makings of what we know can improve orgasms: novelty, trust, fantasy, etc. If you’re comfortable when you’re blindfolded, then chances are you’re going to like the orgasms that follow.
Still, trying it for yourself is the only way to know for sure. So grab your Lioness Smart Vibrator and opt into October’s Sexperiment where we’ll find out if taking away your vision is a trick or treat for your orgasms.
