Declining Sexual Activity and Desire in Women: Findings from Representative German Surveys 2005 and 2016. Juliane Burghardt et al. Archives of Sexual Behavior, December 4 2019. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2019/12/declining-sexual-activity-and-desire-in.html
How strong the tendency among Finns still is to form only one, life-long relationship? Changes in how many partners they have, same-sex experiences, masturbation, etc. Monogamy vs Polygamy. Osmo Kontula. SexuS Journal, Winter-2019, Volume 04, Issue 11, Pages 959-978. https://www.bipartisanalliance.com/2019/09/kow-strong-tendency-among-finns-still.html
, but roughness seems to be increasing:
Herbenick D, Fu T-C, Wright P, et al. Diverse Sexual Behaviors and Pornography Use: Findings From a Nationally Representative Probability Survey of Americans Aged 14 to 60 Years. J Sex Med 2020;XX:XXX–XXX, Feb17 2020. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsxm.2020.01.013
Abstract
Background Convenience sample data indicate that substantial portions of adults have engaged in sexual behaviors sometimes described as rough; little is known about these behaviors at the population level.
Aim To describe, in a U.S. probability sample of Americans aged 18 to 60 years, (i) the prevalence of diverse sexual behaviors, described here as dominant and target behaviors; (ii) the age at first pornography exposure as well as prevalence, range, and frequency of pornography use; (iii) the association between past year pornography use frequency and dominant/target sexual behaviors; and (iv) associations between lifetime range of pornography use and dominant/target sexual behaviors.
Methods A confidential cross-sectional online survey was used in this study.
Outcomes Lifetime engagement in dominant behaviors (eg, spanking, choking, name calling, performing aggressive fellatio, facial ejaculation, penile-anal penetration without first asking/discussing) and lifetime engagement in target behaviors (eg, being spanked, being choked, being called names during sex, having their face ejaculated on, receiving aggressive fellatio, or receiving penile-anal penetration without having discussed) were assessed; lifetime pornography use, age at first porn exposure, past-year frequency of porn viewing, and lifetime range of pornography were also assessed.
Results Women as well as men who have sex with men were more likely to report target sexual behaviors: having been choked (21.4% women), having one's face ejaculated on (32.3% women, 52.7% men who have sex with men), and aggressive fellatio (34.0% women). Lifetime pornography use was reported by most respondents. After adjusting for age, age at first porn exposure, and current relationship status, the associations between pornography use and sexual behaviors was statistically significant.
Clinical Implications Clinicians need to be aware of recent potential shifts in sexual behaviors, particularly those such as choking that may lead to harm.
Strengths & Limitations Strengths include U.S. probability sampling to provide population level estimates and the use of Internet-based data collection on sensitive topics. We were limited by a lack of detail and context related to understanding the diverse sexual behaviors assessed.
Conclusion Clinicians, educators, and researchers have unique and important roles to play in continued understanding of these sexual behaviors in the contemporary United States.
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Check also previous work by some of these authors:
Feeling Scared During Sex: Findings From a U.S. Probability Sample of Women and Men Ages 14 to 60. Debby Herbenick, Elizabeth Bartelt, Tsung-Chieh (Jane) Fu, Bryant Paul, Ronna Gradus, Jill Bauer et al. Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy , Volume 45, 2019 - Issue 5, Pages 424-439, Apr 4 2019. https://doi.org/10.1080/0092623X.2018.1549634
Abstract: Using data from a U.S. probability survey of individuals aged 14 to 60, we aimed (1) to assess the proportion of respondents who ever reported scary sexual situations and (2) to examine descriptions of sexual experiences reported as scary. Data were cross-sectional and collected via the GfK KnowledgePanel®. Scary sexual situations were reported by 23.9% of adult women, 10.3% of adult men, 12.5% of adolescent women, and 3.8% of adolescent men who had ever engaged in oral, vaginal, or anal sex. Themes included sexual assault/rape, incest, being held down, anal sex, choking, threats, multiple people, novelty/learning, among others.
Discussion
Our study provides insights into sexual experiences that 14- to 60-year-old Americans have found scary. Rather than investigate a specific behavioral category (e.g., sexual assault or coercion), we chose to center on respondents’ emotional lives and ask about scary experiences. We hoped to understand more about sexual events that may be problematic, hurtful, or frightening and that may otherwise be missed in research focused only on sexual violence. Our research questions were informed by having heard from students and interview participants, over a number of years, about frightening sexual experiences that seemed to go beyond “bad hook-ups” (Littleton, Tabernik, Canales, & Backstrom, 2009). Sometimes people would describe sexual encounters that were frightening in their entirety; other times, the frightening experience occurred within an otherwise pleasurable sexual encounter. We aimed to augment the literature by addressing both the prevalence of scary sexual experiences and respondents’ descriptions of these.
We were struck, but not surprised, at the gendered aspects of our findings. Substantially more women than men reported that someone had done something during sex that had scared them. This is likely because scary things truly do happen more often to women than men during sex. This is important considering that women’s allegations of assault are still sometimes characterized as simple “misunderstandings” (e.g., Kitchener, 2018; Levin, 2016). We note that some of the men’s descriptions of scary sex (e.g., that referred to menstruation, adolescent/learning curve, first coitus, wondering whether the person who’s performing oral sex is friends with a prior partner) differed considerably from examples more often provided by women that pertained to rape, forced sex, being held down, threatened with weapons, choked, and painful sex that one asks to stop but that does not stop. Even among the pregnancy/STI risk responses, women’s experiences more often alluded to feeling pressured into unprotected sex. In contrast, men’s responses in this category described forgetting to use a condom, not knowing about a partner’s sexual history, or finding out a female partner had many prior sex partners. And yet, the overall proportion of men who reported ever experiencing sex as scary was nearly half that of women; subsequent research might focus on better understanding the range of (perhaps underreported) male trauma.
We identify these gendered differences not to dismiss the experiences of men who had sex with women and who felt scared about some aspect of sex, but to highlight the different kinds of sex (and perhaps the different kinds of fear) that people grapple with during their sexual exploration and development. Those who have not generally experienced alarming aspects of sex, moments in which they wondered whether they were about to be raped or killed, may find it difficult to imagine how scary sex can feel for others. Consequently, some may find it difficult to empathize with what it means to be a sexually active woman in a society where quite scary things happen; we are reminded of Gavey (2012), who wrote about “sexuality in a sexist world.”
We note, too, that quite a few of the men who described scary sexual situations (especially those that involved physical aggression or forced penetration) alluded to the other person being male. This finding is consistent with literature demonstrating that gay and bisexual men are at disproportionately greater risk of sexual violence (Rothman, Exner, & Baughman, 2011). That adults who report lower household income were more likely to report having had scary sexual experiences should be further interrogated. It may be that the scary experiences were traumatic in ways that altered life and career paths for some individuals. Others may have experienced scary sexual experiences as part of a larger pattern of disadvantage or differential opportunity or may have put up with sexual coercion because they felt they had limited options.
We were struck by how often the scary experiences reflected interpersonal violations of the sexual rights identified by WAS (World Association for Sexual Health, 2014). For example, those who wrote about their partner continuing sex after being asked to stop experienced a violation of their autonomy. Respondents who wrote about forced sex, sexual assault, or rape experienced a violation of their right to be free from sexual violence and coercion. In addition, those whose request to use contraception was ignored experienced violations of rights related to making their own reproductive choices. Because the scary experiences were also disproportionately reported by women as well as by men who have sex with men, collectively they reflect sexual inequities derived from societal inequities. Sex that disproportionately frightens women and other minoritized individuals reflects cultural and social issues that need to be reckoned with.
Our findings add to a body of literature that, as described earlier, demonstrates a privileging of men’s sexual pleasure, with women more often reporting lower levels of sexual pleasure and arousal, less frequent orgasm (Herbenick et al., 2010b), more frequent pain (Herbenick et al., 2015) and, described here, more common experiences of frightening sex. Indeed, scholars have long described how women’s economic and political insubordination impacts their sexual lives and opportunities (e.g., Tiefer, 2001), making them vulnerable to sex that feels scary, painful, or beyond one’s ability to control or consent to (e.g., Bay-Cheng, 2010; Gavey, 2012; Tiefer, 2001).
Even in consensual sex, women more often give reasons for having sex that include feeling pressured, obligated, or at the insistence of one’s partner (Meston & Buss, 2007). In addition, many young women choose to continue having vaginal intercourse even when it is painful, not wanting to spoil sex for their partner by interrupting sex (Elmerstig, Wijma, & Swahnberg, 2013). What we know less of is how this comes to be. How common is it for women to begin their sexual lives believing that sex should continue at all costs, even if it hurts? Alternatively, is this something that some women learn from trying to stop painful intercourse only to have their partner ignore their request?
Aside from sexual assault and rape, some of the most common descriptions of sexual situations that respondents found scary involved anal sex or choking. Indeed, in the past few decades, the prevalence of Americans reporting lifetime anal sex has nearly doubled, even as the frequency has remained low (Herbenick et al., 2010a). For such a common behavior, we found it striking how commonly anal sex was included in descriptions of scary sex. Subsequent research might further explore this. To what extent is anal sex scary at first but then evolves into a neutral or even pleasurable experience? What do individuals find scary about anal sex? For some respondents, it seems that the scary aspect was that they had already communicated to their partner that they did not want to have anal sex, but their partner coerced or forced anal sex anyway. For others, their partner did not stop after they were asked to stop or else anal sex got too rough, suggesting that anal sex itself might not necessarily have been scary had it been wanted, consensual, and better communicated about. (By “communicated” we acknowledge the critical roles of both verbal communication and listening/responding.) Indeed, in a series of studies of college men and women, it was not uncommon for women to indicate that their refusals to engage in various sexual behaviors were often met with men expressing displeasure, anger, or continuing with sexual advances despite the woman’s expressed wishes to stop (see Byers, 1996, for overview).
Choking and other aggressive behaviors (such as hitting and forceful hair pulling) were also often described among the scary sexual experiences. Like anal sex, choking appears to have become more commonly portrayed in sexually explicit media and sexual choking behaviors (and interest in choking) are associated with pornography use (Bridges, Sun, Ezzell, & Johnson, 2016; Sun, Wright, & Steffen, 2017). In recent years, choking and various forms of breath restriction/breath play have also become a part of nonsexual games that some adolescents engage in (Linkletter, Gordon, & Dooley, 2010). However, choking and breath play are associated with serious risks—including accidental death—and thus it is not surprising to see choking often described as scary. Most of the choking instances described appear to have not been discussed by partners in advance; the other person just started choking the respondent. Consequently, some worried they were being strangled: a common form of intimate partner violence, especially committed against women who partner with men (Messing, Thomas, Ward-Lasher, & Brewer, 2018). Given how little is known about the role of choking in contemporary sexual repertoires, we encourage subsequent research to consider questions such as the following: How do people first learn about choking during sex? To what extent are sexually explicit media contributing to sexual behaviors such as choking? What do they learn about it? What kinds of conversations do sexual partners have about choking?
Our data provide opportunities for sexuality therapists, educators, parents, and couples to think about the many different ways that sexuality can be experienced. Findings underscore that unwanted, unpleasurable, and even frightening things can happen during sex that is otherwise wanted and pleasurable. Even well-meaning partners can err by introducing sex toys or sex acts that the other person does not like. Our data also speak to the importance of listening to one’s sex partner, that is, not doing something that they have said they do not want to do, stopping sex when they ask to stop, and using condoms or other contraceptives if they ask to do so. Clinicians have a critical role to play in supporting clients to create consensual and mutually pleasurable sexual lives. Clinicians might also consider asking clients about their past experiences with scary or frightening sexual experiences, as sexual history guides often address assault or rape but few other kinds of negative situations.
Strengths and limitations
A strength of our study is that we used the GfK KnowledgePanel, which uses probability-based sampling for panel establishment and is intended to be nationally representative of the English-speaking, non-institutionalized U.S. population. This method was well suited to establishing the prevalence of having experienced scary sexual situations among the U.S. population. We took care to communicate to parents the aims of our study and how we would go about showing questions to their adolescent sons and daughters that were appropriate for their sexual development and experiences to date. Yet, it is possible that parents chose not to allow us to survey their child if they felt their son or daughter was sexually naïve or if they knew they had experienced sexual trauma. As with any study, we can imagine varied reasons that some people may choose not to participate in a study or to allow their child to do so. Given the small number of adolescent reports, these estimates should be viewed with caution and subsequent research should examine adolescents’ scary sexual experiences in greater detail. We also have no way of knowing the full range of scary experiences that respondents had actually endured, and some respondents may have chosen to share a relatively neutral example rather than share something particularly frightening to them. Conversely, some respondents may have chosen to share the worst or more frightening example.
We also collected data over the Internet, which has been shown to facilitate reporting on sensitive topics (Burkill et al., 2016). Yet, a limitation of Internet-based surveys is that they tend to yield less detail than do in-person interviews (some people declined to provide examples of scary situations and others wrote only brief responses). Subsequent research might utilize interviews to better understand the details of individuals’ scary sexual experiences. For this initial study, we were content to leave the idea of feeling “scared” open to interpretation so that we could understand a range of experiences. However, subsequent research may want to differentiate feeling scared about one’s safety versus scared about novel experiences.
Due to budget-related survey space restrictions, we only asked two questions about scary sexual experiences. We did not ask about respondents’ age at the time of the experience, the gender(s) of those involved, or other details. It is unclear how recall bias may have factored into respondents’ endorsement of having experienced scary sexual situations. We hope that our study, in presenting sexual situations experienced as scary, may inform the development of more nuanced research going forward. Subsequent research might investigate how scary situations are resolved (if/when they are) and how they become incorporated into individuals’ sexual learning (e.g., what changes, if any, people make in their lives following scary experiences). Researchers might also examine how people interpret scary sexual situations (including how they may be recast over time), including the extent to which they feel guilt, shame, or anger or alternatively minimize their experience, as commonly occurs in sexually coercive situations (Jeffrey & Barata, 2017).
Our study is not able to address the prevalence of particular types of scary sex. For example, we cannot speculate what percentage of Americans have experienced choking and felt scared by it. Respondents could provide any example of a scary sexual experience, which may have been one of their more frightening or one markedly less so. Our data might inform the development of future checklists of potentially scary situations. The use of such a checklist would be better able to address population-based prevalence of specific experiences.
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