Masturbating and Myth Busting
By Eric Sprankle
“Feel free to have a worry-free orgasm today.”
When I wrote (what I thought was) an innocuous post on social media in 2021 to normalize masturbation, I wasn’t anticipating unleashing a swarm of internet strangers calling me unethical and that I should “do my research” on the harms of masturbating.
For these commenters, masturbation is the bringer of failure, disease, and death. It is a destroyer of bodies and souls. It is the source of depression, social anxiety, sexual dysfunction, and the depletion of “vital nutrients.”
Since comment sections are one of Dante’s circles of Hell, I don’t linger around the name calling by strangers too long. Their assertions were outlandish and easily ignorable. However, having a certain level of humility, I wanted to investigate their claims a little more. Maybe I skipped the day in my sex therapy training when masturbation was discussed as being a plague on civilization. At the very least, even if I could quickly falsify their statements, I wanted to know where they learned this misinformation and why they so easily believed it. This spawned a two-year research project that culminated in my recently published book, DIY: The Wonderfully Weird History and Science of Masturbation.
One of the first interesting findings of my research was uncovering that the anti-masturbation crusaders of today are simply regurgitating pseudoscience and health hucksterism from the 18th and 19th centuries. Physicians like Dr. John Harvey Kellogg, who oversaw the Battle Creek Sanitarium in Michigan in the late 1800s, believed that masturbation caused uterine displacement and psychosis. He suggested masturbatory desire could be curbed by binding the hands at night and eating a bland diet. The dietary recommendations ultimately resulted in the creation of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes.
Graham crackers have a similar origin story and were created to reduce the urge to masturbate, which Reverend Sylvester Graham believed caused tooth loss and “discharges from the anus.”
Fortunately for those of us who like cereal and s’mores, these methods were, and continue to be, ineffective for decreasing sexual desire.
It’s easy to laugh at the quackery of the past, but these attitudes and beliefs about masturbation persist today within the strange bedfellows of religious moralists, wellness influencers, and even among white supremacists. So, let’s examine a few of their beliefs and determine whether there’s any truth to their masturbation scare tactics.
Myth: Masturbation causes depression and anxiety.
Reality: In and of itself, there’s nothing about the physiological process of masturbating that will cause someone to need mental health treatment. As powerful as an orgasm may feel, it isn’t powerful enough to alter neurotransmitters to the point of needing an SSRI.
However, an interesting (and ironic) phenomenon can occur for those who have negative attitudes toward masturbation. For those who think masturbation is unhealthy or sinful, but occasionally masturbate anyway, they may experience psychological distress after orgasm, thus reinforcing the belief that masturbation is unhealthy. This self-fulfilling prophecy is known as moral incongruence. But for those whose masturbation values and behaviors align, no such distress results, freeing them to masturbate as they please without concerns of hellfire or panic attacks.
Myth: Masturbation causes a loss of “vital nutrients.”
Reality: This one is specific to male ejaculation, but it is true that semen contains a whole host of proteins, minerals, and sugars that leave the body during orgasm. However, those nutrients only exist to support the life of sperm cells. The body does not depend on, nor benefit from, the trivial amount of nutrients that sit in the prostate and seminal vesicles waiting to be ejaculated. If it did, wouldn’t someone be able to reap these benefits after masturbating simply by consuming the semen like it was a Men’s One-a-Day multivitamin? Strangely, I’ve never read this as a recommendation by the anti-masturbation advocates.
Myth: Masturbation causes sexual dysfunction.
Reality: There is no empirical evidence showing that masturbation causes sexual dysfunction, and in fact, there is research suggesting the opposite. For women, masturbation (particularly with a vibrator) is associated with better sexual functioning as measured by the Female Sexual Functioning Index, a self-report questionnaire measuring desire, arousal, and orgasm. Vibrators and other sex toys are often viewed as competitors to sexual partners, but they should be viewed as teammates and friends. Just as it is important to remember to replace the batteries in a vibrator, it’s equally important to replace a partner who’s insecure about vibrators.
Myth: Masturbation causes tooth loss and “discharges from the anus.”
Seriously? Unless you’re masturbating with a dinner-plate-sized butt plug and for some reason forgetting to brush your teeth as a result, you don’t need to worry about this one.
The reality debunking all these myths is masturbation is simply a moment of pleasure. It’s not physically harming your body, and it will only be distressing if you think masturbation is distressing. These myths and misinformation about the alleged dangers of self-pleasure stem from ignorance about sexual health and from general scientific illiteracy. To the anti-masturbation commenters who told me I should “do my research,” they should know that doing research also requires understanding research that you’re doing. And the body of research on masturbation does not suggest it is the bringer of disease and death.
So, as I said back in 2021 that started this whole scholarly pursuit to better understand the history and science of masturbation, feel free to have a worry-free orgasm today.
Eric Sprankle, PsyD, is a Professor of Clinical Psychology at Minnesota State University, Mankato.
Select References
Grubbs, J.B., Perry, S.L., Wilt, J.A., and Reid, R.C. (2019). Pornography problems due to moral incongruence: An integrative model with a systematic review and meta- analysis. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 48, 397–415.
Herbenick, D., Reece, M., Sanders, S., Dodge, B., Ghassemi, A., & Fortenberry, J. D. (2009). Prevalence and characteristics of vibrator use by women in the United States: Results from a nationally representative study. The Journal of Sexual Medicine, 6(7), 1857–1866.
Kellogg, J.H. (1877). Plain facts for old and young: Embracing the natural history and hygiene of organic life. I.F. Senger and Co.
Sprankle, E. (2024). DIY: The wonderfully weird history and science of masturbation. Union Square & Co.