Good sleep = Better sex

Women with longer average sleep duration reported better genital arousal.

A team of researchers have found a direct relationship between sleep and sexual performance.

The findings were part of a research to explore impact of sleep on female sexual response and behaviour.

The team lead by David Kalmbach, Todd Arnedt, Vivek Pillai and Jeffrey Ciesla wanted to find if shorter sleep duration and poor sleep quality led to poor female sexual response.

They studied sleep patterns of 171 women free of antidepressants for their influence of nightly sleep duration, sleep quality, and sleep onset latency on daily female sexual response and activity.

It detailed how longer sleep duration was related to greater next-day sexual desire.

Even a one-hour increase in sleep length corresponded to a 14 per cent increase in odds of engaging in partnered sexual activity.

Results showed that women with longer average sleep duration reported better genital arousal than women with shorter average sleep length.

It was concluded that obtaining sufficient sleep is important to promote healthy sexual desire and genital response, as well as the likelihood of engaging in partnered sexual activity.

The results are published in the International Society of Sexual Medicine.

Lead image -- a still from Basic Instinct -- used for representational purposes only.