Arousal

What is arousal?

Arousal (in full: sexual arousal) is the state in which your body and mind get ready for sex. Physically it comes down mostly to more blood flow to the genitals, with women becoming wetter and men getting an erection. Arousal is something other than desire. Libido is the wanting, arousal is the body’s response and the feeling that goes with it.

What arousal looks like in practice

Arousal builds through the body. In the arousal phase William Masters and Virginia Johnson described, the visible signs line up. Blood flow increases, so in a woman the labia and vagina swell and grow wet and in a man an erection forms, while heartbeat and breathing speed up. A common picture is the body already joining in while the mind still has to switch on, or the other way around, someone feeling aroused without many physical signs. That is not a malfunction. It shows that arousal runs on two tracks that do not always move together.

How arousal works

Underneath arousal sits a system of hitting the gas and the brake at once. In their review of the dual control model, Erick Janssen and John Bancroft describe how sexual arousal depends on the balance between sexual excitation and sexual inhibition, and how people differ in how sensitive they are to each. One side switches arousal on, the other slows it down, under stress, distraction or a lack of safety. That is why arousal will not come on command. You can floor the gas, but if the brake is on at the same time, little happens. The same model explains why arousal comes easily to one person and not to another, because the sensitivity of the gas pedal and of the brake differs from person to person. It also explains why the right mood and setting your worries aside often do more than technique.

Why the difference from desire matters

The distinction between desire and arousal is not splitting hairs, it changes how you see yourself. Ellen Laan and Stephanie Both showed that desire can also follow arousal. A meaningful cue sets the body in motion, and the wanting comes after. If you assume desire has to be there first before anything can happen, you miss that order. For a woman who notices that desire does not rise on its own, it can be a relief that arousal has its own way in. For a couple it means building arousal together often works better than waiting for it to arrive in both of you at the same moment. At the same time arousal is not a button you press. It asks for safety, time and the right cue, and if it stays away for a long stretch while it bothers you, that belongs with your doctor.

What arousal is not

“An aroused body means you want sex.” Not necessarily. Physical arousal and the feeling of wanting do not always run in step, see arousal nonconcordance.

“Desire and arousal are the same thing.” They are two things. Desire is wanting (libido), arousal is the response of body and feeling.

“Arousal should come on its own.” Often it comes only after a cue, and with the brake off. Arousal that fails to show is more a matter of circumstances than of unwillingness.

What I see

Most of the women who meet me are relieved to find arousal is not something they have to force. Take the pressure off, give it time, and more gets going on its own than they expected. I do not demand a performance. I let the brake off instead. No rush, no judgment, but real attention. I am not a doctor, and physical complaints are not mine to treat. But I see it again and again: safety has more to do with arousal than technique ever does.

More reading on arousal

Within this glossary, the sexual response cycle lays out which phases arousal fits into, and arousal nonconcordance explains why body and feeling can drift apart.

Beyond this site, the review by Janssen and Bancroft on the dual control model gives the scientific basis, and Thuisarts.nl describes where to go if arousal or desire stays away for a long time.

Where this fits on this site

I do not sell a performance or a quick fix. What I offer is time and attention, exactly the conditions in which arousal gets the room to come on its own. What a date looks like when what you mainly want is calm and closeness is on intimate togetherness. You set the pace yourself, and starting with a conversation is fine.

Sources

• The Dual Control Model of Sexual Response: A Scoping Review, 2009-2022. Erick Janssen & John Bancroft, The Journal of Sex Research, 60(7), 948–968, 2023. Establishes that sexual arousal depends on the balance between sexual excitation and sexual inhibition, and that people differ in their sensitivity to both.
• What Makes Women Experience Desire?. Ellen Laan & Stephanie Both, Feminism & Psychology, 18(4), 505–514, 2008. Establishes that desire can also follow arousal, after a meaningful cue has set the body in motion.
• Human sexual response cycle. Encyclopedic entry on the Masters and Johnson model (1966). Establishes what happens physically in the arousal phase: increased blood flow, becoming wet or an erection, and a faster heartbeat and breathing.

Related terms

Arousal is the body’s response to a sexual cue. The terms below sit around it.

• Sexual response cycle. The model in which arousal is the first phase, followed by plateau, orgasm and resolution.
• Arousal nonconcordance. When physical and felt arousal do not match.
• Libido. The desire for sex, which is something other than arousal itself.
• Edging. Deliberately holding on to high arousal just before orgasm.