title: Thermography as a physiological measure of sexual arousal in both men and women.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Current physiological measures of sexual arousal are intrusive, hard to compare between genders, and quantitatively problematic.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To investigate thermal imaging technology as a means of solving these problems.
  
  
  METHODS
  Twenty-eight healthy men and 30 healthy women viewed a neutral film clip, after which they were randomly assigned to view one of three other video conditions: (i) neutral (N = 19); (ii) humor (N = 19); and (iii) sexually explicit (N = 20).
  
  
  METHODS
  Genital and thigh temperatures were continuously recorded using a TSA ImagIR camera. Subjective measures of sexual arousal, humor, and relaxation were assessed using Likert-style questions prior to showing the baseline video and following each film.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Statistical (Tukey HSD) post-hoc comparisons (P < 0.05) demonstrated that both men and women viewing the sexually arousing video had significantly greater genital temperature (mean = 33.89 degrees C, SD = 1.00) than those in the humor (mean = 32.09 degrees C, SD = 0.93) or neutral (mean = 32.13 degrees C, SD = 1.24) conditions. Men and women in the erotic condition did not differ from each other in time to peak genital temperature (men mean = 664.6 seconds, SD = 164.99; women mean = 743 seconds, SD = 137.87). Furthermore, genital temperature was significantly and highly correlated with subjective ratings of sexual arousal (range r = 0.51-0.68, P < 0.001). There were no significant differences in thigh temperature between groups.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Thermal imaging is a promising technology for the assessment of physiological sexual arousal in both men and women.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada;. Electronic address: kukkonen@ego.psych.mcgill.ca.
authors.forename: Tuuli M
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Kukkonen
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada;; Sex and Couple Therapy Service, Department of Psychology, McGill University Health Center, Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
authors.forename: Yitzchak M
authors.initials: YM
authors.lastname: Binik
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada.
authors.forename: Rhonda
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Amsel
authors.affiliation: Department of Urology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada.
authors.forename: Serge
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Carrier
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001143:Arousal / Q000502:physiology*; D001831:Body Temperature; D004882:Erotica; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D010413:Penis / Q000502:physiology*; D012016:Reference Values; D012725:Sexual Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D013817:Thermography; D014621:Vagina / Q000502:physiology*