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Sex: Myths, Lies and Straight Talk

20/20 Sorts Fiction from the Facts of Life

"Ultimately it's intimate sex that's the most satisfying and fulfilling because the other person already accepts you. They'll accept cellulite or they'll accept potbellies," said clinical psychologist Ellen McGrath.

McGrath says couples who take time to nurture their relationship outside the bedroom will have a better sex life. "They think it's about sex. It's not about sex. It's about the quality of the connection outside the bedroom," she said.

Mark and Dawna Nocera are award-winning professional dancers who teach at their studio in Woburn, Mass. After 15 years of marriage, they say their sex life has never been hotter. They say a great marriage and great sex is very much like a dance. McGrath thinks they've found the secret to great sex and a great marriage.

"Somebody who's just starting out dancing doesn't know anything about the experience that you have 20 years later when you really move," said Mark Nocera. "I think sex is very much like that. It takes a lot of rehearsal to make dancing look that easy."

9. Women Don't Like Porn?

Porn is a man's domain and a turnoff for women, right?

Well, wait a minute. A recent Stanford University study says that contrary to the age-old idea, women do get turned on after watching just a couple of minutes of an erotic video.

Evolutionary anthropologist Helen Fisher says traditionally, erotic videos were made to attract men. They had lots of sex and little if any story line. That was not very appealing to a woman.

Women, according to Fisher, like sexually explicit material if there's some context to it -- porn with a plot.

Companies like Vivid Entertainment and Digital Playground are already banking on it. They claim they're breaking the gender barrier with a softer, more sensual product that's still got plenty of explicit sex.

And with adult movies racking up $11 billion a year -- mostly from men -- women could drive sales up even further.

Director Kelly Holland wants to deliver this passionate porn right into a woman's bedroom through a startup network on Playgirl TV. Holland hopes women will overcome the stigma attached to watching porn and begin enjoying it as an aphrodisiac.

It's all about finding ways to put women in the mood. And with just the right touch, Holland believes she can serve up highly erotic programming to a mainstream female audience that for the most part has been ignored.

"This is the battleground for the feminist movement. And I'm here to bring the battle on," Holland said.

10. Do Herbal Aphrodisiacs Work?

For thousands of years, the secret to better sex has been found along Mother Nature's medicine trail. Chris Kilham, a medicine hunter, treks across the globe in search of plants that add sizzle to sex.

"Every country I travel to has at least one plant that is widely used for sexual enhancement," Kilham said.

Kilham, who teaches plant medicine at the University of Masschusetts-Amherst, reveals his top 10 list of herbal aphrodisiacs in his new book, "Hot Plants." He has now combined these plants into an herbal supplement, also called Hot Plants.

The Food and Drug Administration says there's no proof that herbal aphrodisiacs work.

"Of course the FDA is going to say these don't work," said Kilham. "They have no expertise in herbs. But you have scientists and doctors all around the world who say these things work very well."

ABC's Dr. Tim Johnson talked to doctors familiar with herbs and sexual function to find out if the ingredients in Hot Plants might have an effect on libido.

"Many of these are well-known, well-established in herbal lore. Maca Pura [is] certainly a prosexual; catuaba, certainly a prosexual; rhodiola, definitely a prosexual," said Dr. Steven Lamm.

Recently, a number of studies in reputable journals have looked at some of the individual ingredients in Hot Plants. They were shown to enhance libido and even treat erectile dysfunction.

Labs are one thing -- but what about real life? Can Hot Plants fuel hot sex?

20/20 asked Kathy and Myron Becker to be guinea pigs. Like countless middle-aged couples, their sex life has lost some of its spark.

Kathy was skeptical, but by day three she said she couldn't help but notice a change in her body. "Whatever the herbs are, seem to increase circulation to the pelvic area. And so it gives me the feeling of like, 'Hmmm, I've got a little secret.' "

Her husband certainly noticed. "Kathy seems to enjoy the hum in her nether regions," he said. "I enjoy Kathy's new spark a lot."

But was Kathy Becker's heightened sex drive a physical response to the herbs or a psychological one? That can only be answered by a well-controlled study. Until then, Lamm says it's wrong to simply say herbal aphrodisiacs don't work.

"There are enough active ingredients to have energized this lady," he said. "And it's very possible that it did affect some libido aspect."

That's proof enough for the Beckers, who say, for now, they're a couple of satisfied customers.

[To learn more about herbal aphrodisiacs and herbal medicines, visit the American Botanical Web site at http://www.herbalgram.org.]

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