on,
tend to be aroused later, and less easily in girls than in youths, though
it must also be remembered that boys' traditions and their more active
life keep the tendency in abeyance, while in girls there is much less
frequently any restraining influence of corresponding character.[312] In
my study of inversion I have found that ignorance and the same absence of
tradition are probably factors in the prevalence of homosexual tendencies
among women.[313] After adolescence I think there can be no doubt that
masturbation is more common in women than in men. Men have, by this time,
mostly adopted some method of sexual gratification with the opposite sex;
women are to a much larger extent shut out from such gratification;
moreover, while in rare cases women are sexually precocious, it more often
happens that their sexual impulses only gain strength and
self-consciousness after adolescence has passed. I have been much
impressed by the frequency with which masturbation is occasionally
(especially about the period of menstruation) practiced by active,
intelligent, and healthy women who otherwise lead a chaste life. This
experience is confirmed by others who are in a position to ascertain the
facts among normal people; thus a lady, who has received the confidence of
many women, told me that she believes that all women who remain unmarried
masturbate, as she found so much evidence pointing in this direction.[314]
This statement certainly needs some qualification, though I believe it is
not far from the truth as regards young and healthy women who, after
having normal sexual relationships, have been compelled for some reason or
other to break them off and lead a lonely life.[315] But we have to
remember that there are some women, evidently with a considerable degree
of congenital sexual anaesthesia (no doubt, in some respect or another
below the standard of normal health), in whom the sexual instinct has
never been aroused, and who not only do not masturbate, but do not show
any desire for normal gratification; while in a large proportion of other
cases the impulse is gratified passively in ways I have already referred
to. The auto-erotic phenomena which take place in this way, spontaneously,
by yielding to revery, with little or no active interference, certainly
occur much more frequently in women than in men. On the other hand,
contrary to what one might be led to expect, the closely-related
auto-erotic phenomena during sleep seem