Confusing Data with Assessment: Arousal

Here's a study design that makes me furious: measure clitoral engorgement, ask women if they feel aroused, then conclude that women who have clitoral engorgement yet don't report arousal are 'failing to perceive their own arousal.' The condescension is breathtaking! The researchers have confused engorgement with an internal assessment – arousal. As though engorgement IS arousal. Clitoral engorgement is a physiological event. "I am aroused" is a distributed assessment involving sensation, context, meaning, desire, safety, interest, and countless other factors. A woman whose clitoris is engorged but who does not assess herself as aroused is not aroused. End of story.