ACCELERATED DEVELOPMENT: In prepubescent 21-day-old female rats, the genital cortex region (black) of the somatosensory cortex exhibits accelerated growth when the young female is exposed to touch and contact with a sexually mature male (right, center panel). After nine days of exposure, the genital cortex of the young rat is the same size as that of a fully mature sexual female. PLOS BIOLOGY, 15:e2001283, 2017Contrary to the longstanding belief that puberty is largely controlled by hormones, new evidence shows that sexual touch is a powerful puberty promoter. Touching prepubescent female rats’ genitals can cause the brain region that responds to such tactile stimuli to double in size and their bodies to show signs of puberty up to three weeks earlier than nonstimulated females, according to a report in PLOS Biology on September 21. The study reveals the hitherto unappreciated influence of physical sexual experience on the young brain and body.
“The dominant idea has been that puberty is controlled in the brain and in behavior by the release of hormones . . . but there has been a smattering of findings over the years that additional environmental influences effect puberty and the onset of sexual behavior,” says Dan Feldman of the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the study. This new work “suggests that maybe this is true and that actual tactile stimulation can be something that accelerates the onset of puberty,” he adds.
Puberty in mammals is a period of dramatic changes not just to the body, but to behavior and brain function. Indeed, one of the most pronounced changes, recently observed in both male and female rats, is the doubling ...
