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Q. Why do only 30 percent of women masturbate while almost every male does?

A. First of all, I’m not sure that your percentage is correct. We don’t really know the number of women who do masturbate; we only know the number of women who report on questionnaires that they masturbate, and I doubt that’s an accurate figure. But it is true that there are more men who masturbate than women. That’s probably because we know that men become aroused more easily.

Another reason for the difference comes from society. We condone masturbation among men more so than for women, and for many years we thought that women didn’t masturbate at all. While more knowledge is available, there are still lingering effects of this taboo that still affect women today.