Sex O'Clock News: Victorian-era dildos, HIV prevention and 'overdating'

Ireland unites to buy Victorian-Era dildo

Lead by Shawna Scott, owner of Sex Siopa, Irish Twitter came together to collectively buy a 19th-century ivory dildo. When it came to Shawna’s attention that the ivory dildo was going back up for auction after she’d already seen it being sold off once before, she was determined that this time she was going to keep in it Ireland. With only 90 minutes till the auction and without the money to purchase it herself or the time to set up a crowdfunding campaign, Shawna turned to Twitter for help. Twitter users started to send Shawna money via PayPal, on the promise that it would be returned if their bid was unsuccessful. Luckily, Shawna won the bid at €620, allowing Ireland to keep an important part of its sexual history. Now all she needs is to find a museum to house it in all its glory.

Further developments in HIV prevention

The drug Truvada or pre-exposure prophylaix (PrEP) has proven to be highly effective at preventing HIV infections, with a 99% success rate. Truvada comes in the form of a pill that is taken once a day. However, doctors are working on making it more user-friendly. They are looking at a new strategy called 2+1+1, where the user would take two pills in the 24 hours leading up to having sex and then one pill for two days consecutively afterwards. This model has already proved widely successful. A study presented at the International AIDS Conference showed that out of 3,000 people who used this method over two years, only two contracted HIV.

Women respond to sexual images in the same way as men

The misconception that men are more likely to be turned on by porn and sexual images is being challenged in a new study. The research shows that men and women’s brains respond to porn in the same way. Previous studies have claimed that men’s brains process stimuli differently and as a result are more aroused by images. However, this new study shows that functionally there is very little difference and that both biological sexes have a change in activity in the same brain regions when they look at sexual images. Turns out we aren’t that different after all.

How many people can you date at once?

According to new research done by Match.com’s Chief Scientific Advisor Helen Fisher, PhD, our brains can only handle dating a certain number of people at once. With the rise in dating apps such as Tinder, Fisher claims that the amount of choice we now have isn’t always a good thing. Her new study shows that the human brain isn’t built to cope with so many choices and actually the optimal number of people to be talking to on a dating app is between 5 and 9. Any more and you can fall into the trap of “overdating” which can stifle your chance of finding love. So the next time you are swiping right, be conscious of the potential downside!