London, July 8 (IANS): Not just fantasies, but heavy porn viewing may make some women "hypersexual" - to have sex so frequently that it may cause them problems, a fascinating study reveals.
To get a better idea of what hypersexual women actually do, the researchers surveyed nearly 1,000 women in Germany and asked them how frequently they watched porn and how many sexual partners they have had.
Researchers also assessed hypersexual behaviour in participants using a questionnaire called "Hypersexual Behavior Inventory".
The results showed that the more frequently women watched porn, the more likely they were to score high on the hypersexuality questionnaire.
The behavioural patterns in hypersexual women resembled behaviours previously identified in hypersexual men.
These behaviours include pornography dependence, excessive masturbation and promiscuity.
"The results do not support the idea of previous research that hypersexual women are typically engaged in more passive forms of sexual behaviour like fantasies," researchers said.
The study contradicts the assumption that hypersexual women only use sexual behaviour to control and influence interpersonal relationships, they noted.
"It is still a challenge to identify such individuals who may require treatment without falsely stigmatising others and their 'normal' sexual behaviour," researchers concluded in a Live Science report.