Episode 53: Everything You Think You Know About Sex Is Probably Wrong

Have you ever heard that there are 8,000 nerve endings in the clitoris, or that the clitoris has twice as many nerve endings as the penis? These statements appear as facts in countless social media posts, news articles, and books. There’s just one problem with them, though—they’re wrong. It turns out that so many of the things we think we know about sex and that we hear repeated over and over just aren’t true. That’s why this episode of the podcast is all about what we don’t know about sex. To help us set the record straight, I spoke with Dr. Lisa Dawn Hamilton. She is an associate professor of Psychology at Mount Allison University in Sackville, where she teaches about sex, gender, and neuroscience. Lisa Dawn also has a fantastic podcast called Do We Know Things? that corrects common misconceptions about sex. Some of the topics we explore in this episode include: What is the G-spot, really? Do we actually know what the average penis size is? Can men have multiple orgasms, too? Does peeing after sex really reduce your risk of getting urinary tract infections? What is the real purpose of pubic hair, and how is public hair removal related to STD risk? How do hormones like testosterone and oxytocin really affect us? How do the brains of monogamous and non-monogamous men differ? What’s the connection between sexual arousal and disgust? Why does disgust sometimes become a sexual turn-on? To learn more about Lisa Dawn and her work, visit doweknowthings.com This podcast was made on Zencastr. Join Zencastr today and receive 40% off of their professional plan for 3 months with my exclusive discount code: sexandpsych *** Want to learn more about Sex and Psychology? Click here for previous articles or follow the blog on Facebook, Twitter, or Reddit to receive updates. You can also follow Dr. Lehmiller on YouTube and Instagram. Listen and stream all episodes on Apple, Spotify, Google, or Amazon. Subscribe to automatically receive new episodes and please rate and review the podcast! Credits: LEGIT Audio (Podcast editing) and Shutterstock/Florian (Music). Image created with Canva; photos used with permission of guest.