The anterior cingulate cortex is an important cognitive control area for both sexually arousing and disgust stimuli; the activation of the thalamus may indicate a general automatic response towards sexual disgust

Long, Xipeng and Tian, Fangfang and Zhou, Yushan and Cheng, Bochao and Yi, Siqi and Jia, Zhiyun, The Neural Correlates of Sexual Arousal and Sexual Disgust (September 23, 2019). SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3458493

Abstract
Background: Humans exhibit category-specific networks of activity when viewing sexual stimuli. The differences and relationships between stimulus-related brain activation for sexual arousal and sexual disgust are still unclear. This study aimed to identify brain regions that were mostly associated with sexual stimuli.

Methods: A systematic search was performed to identify fMRI studies that reported brain activity during sexual stimuli. The activation foci were subjected to meta-analysis using the activation likelihood estimation (ALE) method. Subsequently, meta-analytic connectivity modelling (MACM) was used to create a model for the core brain network involved in responses to sexual stimuli. The functional properties of the network were assessed using behavioural domain (BD) metadata in the BrainMap database.

Findings: An ALE meta-analysis of a total of 368 subjects showed that sexual stimuli are related to the extensive activation of the occipital-temporal-limbic system and less extensive activation of the basal ganglia. Sexual arousal activated mainly the anterior cingulate cortex and right fusiform gyrus, while sexual disgust activated the limbic system, occipital gyrus, and thalamus. MACM analysis showed a network of the core brain areas involved in response to sexual stimuli, and behavioural domain analysis indicated that these areas have both common and discrete functional properties.

Interpretation: Our findings suggested that the anterior cingulate cortex is an important cognitive control area for both sexually arousing and disgust stimuli. The activation of the thalamus may indicate a general automatic response towards sexual disgust. These results revealed consistent coactivation maps across experiments and behaviours for convergent areas.

Keywords: sexual arousal; sexual orientation; activation likelihood estimation; meta-analytic connectivity modelling; fMRI; behavioural domain