<< Female Genital Secretions >>

The glands connected with the female reproductive tract increase their activity during sexual arousal. The Bartholin glands, which open in the vestibule just outside the entrance to the vagina, are the source of a clear, quite liquid, and somewhat slippery secretion. This secretion should not be confused with the usually thicker and often more colored secretions which frequently come from vaginal or cervical infections, or which constitute the so-called uterine discharges. During sexual activity, an increase in Bartholin secretions provides one of the best indicators of erotic response. Of this fact many observant participants in sexual activities are well aware. The absence of such a secretion is ordinarily evidence that there is no arousal, except among some older women in whom all secretions may be limited, and in occasional instances of anatomic abnormalities.
Secretions of the Bartholin glands during sexual arousal are commonly recognized. In the literature, they are mentioned, for instance, by: Rohleder 1907 (1):310. Bloch 1908:50. Talmey 1912:60. Moll 1912:25. Malchow 1923:133. Kisch 1926:290-291. Hirschfeld 1928(2):225, 231. Van de Velde 1930: 195. Dickinson 1933, 1949:48. Havelock Ellis 1936(11,1) :145. Kahn 1939:74, 85. Sadler 1944:14, 39. Negri 1949:82. Brown and Kempton 1950:19. Faller in Hornstein and Faller 1950:236. Stone and Stone 1952:61, 173.

In addition to providing lubrication, the alkaline Bartholin secretions may neutralize the normal acidity of the vagina and prevent that acidity from killing the sperm which are ejaculated in coitus.
The function of the Bartholin secretions in reducing the acidity of the vagina, thus giving the sperm greater longevity, was suggested some years ago (e.g., Talmey 1912:58), and is treated more fully by Siegler 1944:223.

The cervix, which is the tip of the uterus which projects into the vagina, also secretes a mucus, and when there is arousal this secretion may become even more copious than the Bartholin secretions. In clinical practice, when it has been necessary to remove the Bartholin glands, it is found that the cervical glands still supply enough mucus for vaginal lubrication. On the other hand, extirpation of the cervical glands, even while the Bartholin glands are still functioning, may so reduce the vaginal secretions as to interfere with coitus. This indicates that the cervical secretions are more important than they have sometimes been considered.
Data from Dr. Sophia Kleegman in litt.

The cervical secretions are also important because they may loosen the mucous plug which ordinarily lies in the opening (the os) of the cervix.
Cervical secretions are discussed in: Bloch 1908:50. Talmey 1912:60; 1915:91. Urbach 1921:133. Kisch 1926:287, 296. Bauer 1927(2):159. Hirschfeld 1928(2):225. Van de Velde 1930:194. Dickinson 1933, 1949:fig. 102. Havelock Ellis 1936(11,1):162. Brown and Kempton 1950:18. In an unpublished ms., Dickinson estimates a cervical secretion of 1 to 4 cc. during arousal.

Unless the cervical canal is opened, sperm which have been deposited in the vagina cannot move into the uterus and egg ducts (Fallopian tubes), and fertilization may therefore be prevented.
That the cervical os may be opened to the passage of sperm, through cervical secretory activity, is discussed by: Dickinson 1933, 1949:92-94. Weisman 1941:111-113, 130-131. Siegler 1944:229-231. Gardner in Howell (Fulton edit.) 1949:1179.

There is considerable variation in the quantity of the vaginal secretions among different females. There may also be variation in the quantity of the secretion at different times in the same individual. This depends upon the intensity of her sexual response, upon her physiologic state, and, interestingly enough, upon the timing of the activity within the menstrual month. About 59 per cent of our sample of women with coital experience recognized such a monthly fluctuation in their vaginal secretions during erotic arousal. About 69 per cent of those who recognized such a fluctuation reported that the mucus was most abundant when sexual activity occurred one to four (or more) days before the onset of menstruation. Some 39 per cent reported that the maximum secretion during arousal occurred soon after the menstrual flow had ceased. About 10 per cent reported that it occurred in the course of the menstrual flow itself, and 11 per cent reported that it occurred in the middle of the month near the time of ovulation. These percentages total more than one hundred because some of the women reported that the increased secretion had occurred both before and after menstruation.

In interviewing for the present study, we have inquired about fluctuations in vaginal mucous secretions before we have discussed fluctuations in erotic responsiveness. The data so obtained indicate that the time of maximum mucous secretion and the time of maximum erotic responsiveness are almost always the same. The record of fluctuations in erotic response is therefore of especial significance, since it originated in questions concerning a physical reality, the vaginal secretions, which could be precisely identified. If it had been based on questions concerning erotic arousal, the answers might have represented more subjective judgments.

However, these records on the human female do not fit the laboratory data on the periods of sexual responsiveness in some other mammals. These periods of response, the so-called periods of heat or estrus, occur periodically, and in many of the mammals (but not in all of them) the females rarely accept the males for coitus except during these periods of heat.
Since heat or estrus is often defined as a period in which the female accepts the male, the acceptance of copulation outside of estrus is not often mentioned. Williams 1943:125 says “Copulation in female domestic animals is physiologically limited to the period of estrum . . . outside these periods the female absolutely refuses the sexual advances of the male.” But also see: Miller 1931:384, 387. McKenzie and Terrill 1937:10. Andrews and McKenzie 1941:7, 11, 20-22. Hartman 1945:23 ff. Asdell 1946:passim. Roark and Herman 1950: 7-11. Whitney; Farris; and Bissonette in Farris 1950b: 199, 246-247, 264. A general summary of the data on periodicity is to be found in Marshall 1936.

Ovulation, the release of an egg from the ovary preparatory to its passage down the egg ducts where fertilization may occur (Figure 118f), takes place during this period of heat, and at no other time in the female’s cycle. This means that the infra-human female has coitus near the time of ovulation, and therefore at the period in which coitus is most likely to lead to fertilization and reproduction. Among the monkeys and apes, which are practically the only animals besides the human which menstruate, the period of maximum sexual arousal may also come just before or concurrently with the time of ovulation, which is about midway between the periods of menstrual flow.
The close relationship between ovulation and estrus is discussed by: Ball and Hartman 1935. Marshall 1936:447-448. Corner 1942:70. Yerkes 1943:62-66. Hartman 1945:23 ff. Asdell 1946:13-25. Beach 1947b:272-274, 292, 293. Gardner in Howell (Fulton edit.) 1949:1170. Ford and Beach 1951:201-204, 273. Houssay 1951:639. There may be some slight discharge of blood at the time of ovulation in some human females and in the females of some other species. This Mittelschmerz is more pronounced in the dog, but it is an ovulatory discharge and not menstruation.

The location of the period of heat near the time of ovulation is, obviously, advantageous to the propagation of any species. The occurrence of the period of maximum sexual responsiveness in the human female just before the onset of menstruation and therefore at her most sterile period, does not appear so advantageous for the accomplishment of fertilization. To those who believe that the evolutionary origins of new structures and physiologic characters are determined by their advantage or disadvantage (i.e., by Darwinian adaptation and selection), it seems proper and correct that a period of arousal should occur close to the time of ovulation. Therefore some laboratory students, working with lower mammals, have been loath to accept the human data.
Reluctance to believe that the human female's maximal arousal does not coincide with ovulation is noted or discussed in: Tinklepaugh 1933:335. Hartman 1936:77-86. Yerkes and Elder 1936a:38. Stone in Allen et al. 1939:1228-1230, 1258. Benedek and Rubenstein 1942:4. Ford and Beach 1951:210-213.

On the other hand, most of the research on human subjects has produced data which accord with our own. They are confirmed by observations which have been made by a number of the husbands who have contributed histories to the present study. Some of the women who masturbate only once in a month do so in the period just before or immediately after menstruation. Evidently the human female, in the course of evolution, has departed from her mammalian ancestors and developed new characteristics which have relocated the period of maximum sexual arousal near the time of menstruation.
Others who find that the period of maximum responsiveness in the human female is close to the time of menstruation, are: Sturgis ca. 1908:23. Schbankov acc. Weissenberg 1924a: 10. Robie 1925:124. Hamilton 1929:197-198. Hamilton and Macgowan 1929:91. Hoyer 1929:20-21. Davis 1929:220-229. Kelly 1930:222. Van de Velde 1930:285-286. Kopp 1933:98-100. McCance et al. 1937:597-599, 609. Terman 1938:351. Popenoe 1938:17. Dickinson ms. Stone and Stone 1952:239. The outstanding exception is Benedek and Rubenkein 1942 and Benedek 1952:6-12, 144-159. This latter work, which combines psychoanalytic and endocrine data, concludes that sexual desire in the human female is highest at mid-month, immediately preceding ovulation. No understandable interpretation is given as to why other studies fail to concur.

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