The Dual Control Model that revolutionises your sex life

Emily Nagoski is a sex educator, science lover, and author of the NY Times best sellers "Come As You Are" and "Burnout". She is also the host of the "Come as You Are" Podcast, which has the potential to completely revolutionise your relationship with your sex life. Nagoski makes sure her science and advice extends to the LGBTQ+ community and uses ground breaking research and other leading experts to bust cultural myths around sex and sexuality.

One of the key topics she refers to is the "dual control model", a model for sexual response that states the sexual response mechanism in your brain is controlled by a juxtaposing pair of mechanisms, termed an accelerator and a brake.

The sexual accelerator notices all the sex related cues in your environment to send signals that 'turn you on', deduced from smell, touch, taste as well as from your thoughts, beliefs and imaginations. Our accelerators are functioning at low levels all the time, including as you read this article about sex, which likely stimulates your accelerator a little bit. Nagoski points out a lot of sex advice is aimed at increasing the stimulation of our accelerators, but often neglects addressing our brakes, or 'turn offs'. In the dual control model, the process of becoming aroused is a simultaneous process of turning on the 'ons' AND turning off the 'offs'. Nagoski disclaims that the model is more complex than this, with there being multiple brake systems, however these basic principles are enough to start being applied to our own sex lives.

So, if you find you struggle to get fully aroused in the moment despite having all the right 'accelerator' cues, it might be that your 'brakes' are simultaneously being over stimulated, which can be caused by a huge variety of factors. Many minor brakes, such as worrying about being walked in or heard, can be more easily fixed, by locking the door or only having sex when no-one is home. Other brakes such as stress, body self-criticism, relationship issues and trauma history, may all require more directed long-term approaches to overcome.

Environment can also be crucial, as demonstrated by studies that aim to research how orgasms affect the brain. These studies require participants to masturbate to orgasm inside an FMRI machine, and among the type of crowd who are even willing to participate in this research, only half are able to achieve this, while the context keeps the brakes on for the rest. However, when a Dutch researcher allowed participants to wear their socks the likelihood the person orgasmed doubled. It turned out that having cold feet had been the biggest brake, distracting participants enough to prevent orgasm, but this brake was released simply by giving them warm socks.

So how can we apply this model to our own sex lives? Make a basic list of all the cues that typically activate your accelerator and a corresponding list of those that stimulate your brakes. If you have a regular sexual partner, get them to do the same, and communicate your brakes to each other in order to stop them from being activated.

Other podcasts that have helped me to create a healthy relationship between me and sex are "Betwixt the Sheets" and "Shameless Sex", both LGBTQ+ friendly resources. Betwixt the Sheets is hosted by Sex Historian Kate Lister, who has different expert guests on for each episode, to discuss where modern day myths around different sex and gender related topics have come from through a historical lens. The podcast covers everything from landmark LGBTQ+ court cases, to political scandal, bizarre medieval cures for impotence, the etymology of swear words, gender bias in medicine, satanic panic and cults and so much more. It also spans completely different time periods; from ancient civilisations, to the middle ages, to renaissance and early modern...right up to now.

"Shameless Sex" is hosted by Amy, Relationship Coach and Sex Educator, and April, a motivational speaker and leading female sex toy mogul. They share a passion for promoting unabashed, pleasure-focused sexuality education, by hosting other guest experts to discuss a huge range of topics many people are too afraid to discuss with their own peers. I hope people who have taken the time to read this piece can go off and explore these incredible resources, and more importantly revolutionise your relationship with sex!