News in Science › Being Human

Row over G spot nears climax

After more than half a century of debate and bedroom exploration, a row about the location of the fabled G spot may be settled at last, research suggests.

The G spot, named after the German gynaecologist Dr Ernst Gräfenberg who first mooted its existence in 1950, is said to be a highly sensitive area in the vagina that, when stimulated, gives a woman a powerful orgasm.

But where the G spot is located has been clouded by evidence that is subjective or downright contradictory, and some experts have even concluded that it does not exist.

The answer, according to Italian researcher Associate Professor Emmanuele Jannini, is that, yes, the G spot does exist, but only among those women who are lucky enough to have it, New Scientist reports.

Jannini, of the University of L'Aquila, used an ultrasound to scan a key vaginal area among nine women who say they experience vaginal orgasms and 11 who say they don't.

The target was an area of tissue on the front vaginal wall located behind the urethra.

Tissue was notably thicker in this space among the first group of women compared with the second, the scans revealed.

Jannini, who reports the research online in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, says the evidence is clear.

"Women without any visible evidence of a G spot cannot have a vaginal orgasm," he says.

"For the first time, it is possible to determine by a simple, rapid and inexpensive method if a woman has a G spot or not."

Part of the clitoris?

Some experts question whether what Jannini calls the G spot is a distinct structure or the internal part of the clitoris, whose size is highly variable.

Others say more work is needed to confirm Jannini's finding that the G spot is missing in women who don't experience vaginal orgasm.

The G spot could be there in all women, but with differing degrees of sensitivity, they believe.

Women who do not have a G spot should not despair, says New Scientist.

"They can still have a normal orgasm through stimulation of the clitoris," says Jannini.