Difference between why men and women masturbate discovered in groundbreaking study

A study into British masturbation has shed some light on the differing motives men and women have for indulging in a bit of private time beyond the pursuit of pleasure.

There's a very obvious reason why anyone masturbates, but scientists have looked into whether there are other factors at play and what further motivations might be.

Research from last year took findings from the British National Surveys of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles which indicated that masturbation had become more common among Brits from the early 2000s to the early 2010s.

You can draw your own conclusions as to whether the growing prominence of the internet had anything to do with that, but the study also had some interesting findings about why people introduce their hands to their nether regions.

The researchers noted: "Previous evidence suggests that masturbation has a complementary function for women and a compensatory function for men."

Research has lifted the lid on how often men and women put aside time for a bit of self pleasure (Getty Stock Image)

Basically, previous evidence indicates that men would indulge in sessions of choking the chicken to make up for not being sexually active, whereas women would flick the bean alongside an active sex life.

However, digging deeper into the findings beyond the past assumptions the scientists said these old ideas 'may not remain valid', but what they found was that in many cases the past assumption did hold water.

A link between an active sex life and masturbation

They said: "Men who reported the highest intercourse frequency were less likely to report masturbation in the past month, while women with higher intercourse frequency were more likely to report masturbation in the past month."

Essentially, men having lots of sex were not masturbating as much while women having lots of sex were, with the researchers noting that this may be because 'more sexually active liberated women' saw masturbation as part of 'a broader sexual repertoire'.

That being said, the idea that men and women are on very different pages as far as masturbation is concerned doesn't hold up all the time as many of the lads and ladies who were enjoying themselves had the same reasons for doing so.

Changing attitudes over the years have resulted in people's behaviour changing too (Getty Stock Photo)

The researchers said: "Women and men reporting masturbation in the past month were more likely to report: preference for more frequent intercourse; discrepant sexual interest with a partner; dissatisfaction or distress/worry about their sex life; or sexual difficulties or a partner with sexual difficulties.

"Hence, when partnered sexuality faces challenges, masturbation may serve as a replacement for both women and men."

Not so different after all, and it stands to reason that whether you're a man or a woman if you're not satisfied with your sex life you'd take the problem quite literally into your own hands.

The researchers found that the compensatory approach to masturbation, making up for the lack of a satisfying sex life, was a behaviour both men and women shared.

They also noted that there were limitations to their study, as the results they were working with relied upon people to be honest about their sexual and masturbation habits, while they said the data also didn't account for non-binary individuals or how changing attitudes towards masturbation would alter the results.