Yes, masturbating can boost your sex drive - here's what the research says

• It's unclear whether masturbation leads to an increase or decrease in testosterone levels.
• But there is slightly more evidence that more masturbation may be linked to a higher sex drive.
• If you are unhappy with your sex drive or testosterone levels, consult your physician.

Your body goes through many changes when you masturbate - your heart beats faster, your blood pressure rises, and you may have a spike in certain hormones like prolactin. But testosterone, the main male sex hormone, changes very little before, during, or after you orgasm.

Experts believe that over time, masturbating can increase your sex drive, but though high sex drive is often linked to higher testosterone, more research is still needed to see whether masturbating more often can affect your testosterone over the long term.

Here's what you need to know about how masturbating is linked to your testosterone levels and overall sex drive.

How does masturbation affect testosterone?

For both men and women, masturbating won't boost your testosterone levels in the moment, and it's still not clear whether masturbating can change your testosterone levels in the long term.

Currently, there are studies that show links between masturbating and long-term testosterone, but "there has never been a study that randomly assigned people to varying levels of sexual activity 'long term'," Nicole Prause, PhD, a sexual psychophysiology researcher and founder of Liberos, a sexual biotechnology company.

For this reason, we don't yet know if your testosterone increases or decreases when you masturbate more often.

What the research says

Here is some of the conflicting research on whether masturbating raises or lowers your testosterone over time:

• A 2016 study that examined adults over age 57 found that men who masturbated more often had higher levels of testosterone. This link continued over a five-year period. For the women in the study, masturbating more didn't have a significant effect on their testosterone levels.
• A 2015 study found that middle-aged women who masturbated more often tended to have higher testosterone levels, but the study did not measure whether masturbating more often actually increased testosterone.
• One small study showed the opposite effect, finding that men who didn't have sex or masturbate for three weeks had higher levels of testosterone. The study also found that when men masturbated, their testosterone remained relatively stable before, during, and after their orgasm.

• Another small study showed similar results - men who didn't masturbate for an extended period had a 45% rise in testosterone levels on the seventh day of the study.

How masturbation affects sex drive

There may be no clear answer about maturbation's long-term effects on testosterone, but research suggests that masturbating likely does have an effect on your sex drive.

What the research says

• A 2007 study found that women who masturbated more often had a greater drive to masturbate, along with higher testosterone levels. The men in this study tended to have a higher sex drive than the women, and the researchers say that this may be at least partly because they masturbated more often.
• A 2014 study showed that people with a higher sex drive masturbated more often, but it's difficult to know whether masturbating increased sex drive or if a higher sex drive lead to masturbating.

More studies are needed on this subject, Prause says, but there is reason to believe that sexual activity may be a 'use it or lose it' phenomenon. "It appears that regular masturbation is associated with increased sex drive," Prause says, while avoiding masturbation is linked to a lower sex drive.

Insider's takeaway

Masturbating won't change your testosterone while you're doing it, but we don't have enough research to know if it affects your testosterone over the long term.

But even if your testosterone isn't affected, there is some evidence that masturbating more often can raise your sex drive.

If you're looking to make a change in your testosterone levels or your sex drive, it may help to talk to your doctor or a sex therapist to find out more about your options.