Gendered Failures and Achievements in Women’s Experiences of Men’s Orgasms

Previous research has shown that women’s orgasms function as a masculinity achievement for men. Less clear is whether men’s orgasms function as a gendered achievement for women. In the present study, we explored this question via an experimental design by randomly assigning 440 women (M age = 32.29, SD age = 11.91) to read a vignette in which they imagined that an attractive man either did or did not orgasm during a sexual encounter with them. The women then rated their feelings of achievement, failure, femininity, and masculinity in response to the scenario along with how much they would attribute the situation to themselves or to the man partner. Results showed that women experienced men’s orgasm presence as a femininity achievement and men’s orgasm absence as a femininity failure. There were lesser impacts on women’s feelings of masculinity. Feelings of achievement and failure were stronger for women who attributed the scenario more strongly to themselves. Further, greater sexual assertiveness in general predicted stronger feelings of achievement in response to men’s orgasm presence and greater feminine gender role stress predicted stronger feelings of failure in response to men’s orgasm absence. Together, findings highlight that men’s orgasm seems to function as an achievement for women; however, the connection to femininity (which is less valued and prescribed differently compared to masculinity) denotes that men’s orgasms for women are a different gendered experience with different stakes compared to women’s orgasms for men.