NICE WORK: Talking about Sex-with-Others–with Your Partner!
Are people really having less sex? Well, at the very least, it looks like they are having less sex outside of their committed relationships, according to a new study written up in Scientific American. But it also looks like people may be making up for having less sex outside of committed relationships by talking about it more. And that is good news for sex.
First the news: In each category surveyed—gay, lesbian, straight—people report fewer affairs now than in the 1970s. Everybody has changed in terms of monogamy: gay men do it (where do it means doing non-monogamy) 59% now versus 82% in the 1970s. Nowadays, straight men do it less—14%. Meanwhile, 13% of straight women and 8% of lesbians do it. As we keep seeing again and again in recent surveys on monogamy, women—lesbian and straight—still report fewer affairs than their male counterparts, but they are catching up with the boys, as UW psychologist David Atkins has shown. On the one hand, affairs overall may be on the decline because of STDS and the like; on the other hand, women may be catching up because they have greater autonomy and economic independence.
That is all interesting, but this is also potentially good news for wild, free-for-all sex. The investigators from Alliant International University in San Francisco showed that over the same period people have also increased how much they talk to their partners about the idea of sex outside of their relationship. (What’s happening in those conversations, report these psychologists, is that they are talking about outside liaisons, and deciding against them.)
But the other discovery here is about the talking. Increasingly, this study hints, people are talking about the notion of sex outside their relationship–talking about forbidden, off-the-approved-roster sex with someone who isn’t an official or legal sweetheart–even if in the end they decide against it. Conversations like that—no matter what the outcome—mean that more and more people are acknowledging, countenancing, and admitting that they and their partners are completely capable of having sexual fantasies about someone other than their official one. We all know that being in a committed relationship doesn’t change our brain structure and doesn’t stop a great, diverse sexual imagination about all manner of things, people, and situations. But when people don’t talk about it, they have to tell one another lies, and pretend like their fantasies don’t exist.
So, maybe people are saying no to the reality of sex with their hot new colleague, but if they are saying yes to a conversation about it with their partner, it might mean that those partners will be better at dreaming up their own edgier, more interesting sex. And, by the way, in a world where women have greater sexual freedom to have affairs, they also have greater freedom to acknowledge desire and have conversations about it that can lead to fewer affairs.
Last 5 posts by Virginia Rutter
- NICE WORK: workfamily conflict sucks - January 25th, 2010
- NICE WORK: Narrowing the Gap in Marriage - January 20th, 2010
- NICE WORK: Men with Pens - December 28th, 2009
- NICE WORK: Woman's Nation = Workers' Nation - November 10th, 2009
- NICE WORK: Shamming Sick Days? No. Shamming Data? Yes. - November 2nd, 2009
September 1st, 2009 at 6:11 am
Eww, you linked to psychologists! Just kidding. Interesting data, and the comments at the SciAm site are notable. I’d like to dig up the presentation and get a little more info. Thanks for the post! Yay sex!
September 1st, 2009 at 8:17 am
Monogamy in Heterosexual and Same-Sex Couples: Changes Over 25 Years - Gabrielle Gotta, Robert-Jay Green (with Esther Rothblum, Sondra Solomon, Kimberly Balsam, Pepper Schwartz, Philip Blumstein). Alliant website.
September 1st, 2009 at 5:10 pm
Martin! Excellent sleuthing. The work is a continuation of Blumstein & Schwartz’s American Couples survey. So based in sociology after all! Yay sex, indeed! and Yay sociology of sex!
September 5th, 2009 at 2:52 am
прикона)
September 8th, 2009 at 8:38 pm
anybody mentioned polyamory?
September 9th, 2009 at 10:29 am
That’s what I was thinking, cm. They sort-of mentioned it: “discussed sex outside the relationship and decided that under some circumstances it is all right,” but they didn’t name it as such. They seem to not discriminate between cheating and agreed-upon extra-relationship sex, lumping both together under “non-monogamy”. And they also don’t mention the difference between completely open relationships (you can date other people) and relationships that are only sexually open, although there’s a subtle nod to that in the use of “primary relationship” in the third paragraph. However, I expect that the survey was so monogacentic, that sort of not-at-all-subtle distinction wasn’t captured.
September 11th, 2009 at 11:23 pm
[...] and scholars I respect. Earlier this week, Courtney Martin at Feministing mentioned a post by Virginia Rutter at Girl w/Pen. Virginia Rutter is a smart, serious scholar. But I wasn’t convinced by this post, where she [...]
September 23rd, 2009 at 8:52 pm
This is definitely the case for me, and I’m so glad to know I’m not alone!
What does this represent? Some sort of collective step forward in maturity?
I recently had an ex with whom I had quite a bit of unfinished business resurface via Facebook. As my conversations with him went from fun to closure to, “I wonder if he can offer me more than I have now?” I talked with my husband about it every step of the way.
What was so liberating for me was the ability to get the answers I needed about the road not taken, and maintain the connection I have with my husband. We ARE having less sex than we did a year ago, but strangely enough we’re closer than ever. Talking about these things together has brought me to a new level of respect and love for him, and I am so glad to have made the decision to be open instead of holding my questions, fears, and desires close.