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Ways that men misunderstand penis size July 17 2007 Many men think their penis is small, often too small. Research confirms that heterosexual men worry about penis size more than women do, and are more dissatisfied with the size of their own penis than women are with their partners’ penis size. There are many reasons why men think their penis is too small, and all of them have to do with comparing your penis to someone else’s penis, which, I would argue, is a fruitless exercise. Early Penis Sightings For many men the first time they see penises as adolescents will be seeing their father naked. If you’re very young seeing a naked parent’s penis will likely seem big both because of the difference in body size between a child and an adult, and also because of the angle (seeing something from below can make it look bigger). In this way some of men’s earliest data on penis size are skewed. Locker Room Syndrome Most heterosexual boys and men don’t see too many penises outside of the change room or locker room, and possibly home if there are male siblings or parents in the house. Checking out other men’s penises in a locker room situation carries many pitfalls. For one, you rarely get a chance to take a really good look. As well, the size of a flaccid penis may vary greatly from man to man, but the size of an erect penis doesn’t vary as much. In locker rooms (well most of them) the penises you see are usually flaccid. In a study of men who sought medical help for concerns about having a small penis, 62% of men said their concerns began in childhood as a result of comparing penis size to that of their friends. Porn Comparisons A lot of men will get sex information from watching pornography, which is a terrible way to learn anything about sex (except perhaps that sex is fun). Male porn stars have larger penises and there are lighting and pubic hair styling tricks that make them look even bigger. Remember, the camera puts on ten pounds. In the same study cited above, just over 37% of men say their concern about penis size began after seeing porn. Visual Orientation When you look at your own penis you are probably most often looking at it from above. This is an angle that makes your penis look smaller. If you stand naked in front of a full length mirror both facing the mirror and in profile, you’ll get a better idea of what your penis looks like to others (if this is your concern). Just as looking from below can impact our earliest ideas of penis size, always looking from above can make you think your penis is smaller than it is. What’s Average? Finally, men who think their penis is too small are probably unaware of what average penis size is thought to be in the first place. According to some reviews, average erect penis length is between 5.1 and 5.7 inches.(other reviews put it slightly higher at 5.5 to 6.3). In either case somewhere around five and a half inches is an average penis length. It’s not that there aren’t men who live with very small penises (known as a micropenis) but statistically speaking, most men will be somewhere in the middle. Source: Mondaini N, Gontero P. “Idiopathic Short Penis: Myth or Reality?” BJU International Volume 95 (2005): 8-9. |