A few days ago, I heard on the radio about a study that found that people in their 20s were having sex once every three days, people in their 30s were having sex once every four days, in their 40s it was once every five days, every eight days in their 50s, every 13 days in their 60s, and every 26 days in their 70s- or something like that, I was looking for a link to the exact study and couldn’t find it. So that got me wondering about how much do average Americans actually have sex, and what is considered normal? To do so, I started doing some research about sex studies that have been done in the past.

Alfred Kinsey was probably the first person who could be considered a “sexologist”, or someone who uses the scientific method to study human sexual behavior. His “Sexual Behavior in the Human Male”, published in 1948, and subsequent “Sexual Behavior in the Human Female” in 1953, were truly groundbreaking in that they demonstrated that humans were significantly less heterogeneous than previously suspected. In other words, there was a much higher percentage of “deviant” sexual behavior (or what was considered deviant at the time) among humans, including significant percentages of masturbation, sadomasochism, marital infidelity and homosexuality. To come up with his data, Kinsey interviewed thousands of subjects on the minutia of their sexual lives, then tabulated his results.

According to his research, Kinsey dropped the following bombshells:

• Approximately 50% of married males had engaged in extramarital affairs; 26% of women had done same
• 10% of men were exclusively homosexual and 37% had had at least one homosexual experience in their lifetime
• Average frequency of marital sex was 2.8 times per week
• 22% of men and 12% of females enjoyed sadomasochism

Obviously, these reports, published in the conservative 40s and 50s were a media sensation and public scandal, rife with controversy. It is unclear how accurate these findings are, especially since some argue that Kinsey himself had a bias towards the kinky due to his own alternative lifestyle.  Also, Kinsey tended to find his subjects wherever he could, which included hitchhikers, prisoners, as well as mental patients. So, it is really unclear if Kinsey was able to obtain a truly representative sample. Interestingly, there had not been another large scale scientific study on the sexual lives of Americans until a team of researchers from the University of Chicago came up with a new study in 2001 in which they polled 3500 random Americans, aged 18 to 59.  This study was able to poll a more general cross-section of the population, so is more likely to be more accurate.  And as surprising as the results of the Kinsey papers are, this study is just as surprising, except in a completely opposite way. Apparently, instead of being kinky and adventurous, the sex lives of average Americans are actually far more boring than we ever suspected. Here are some of the highlights:

• Americans falls into three groups- one third have sex two or more times a week, one third have sex a few times a month and one third have sex times a few times a YEAR or NONE AT ALL.  So, basically a full two thirds of Americans have sex only several times a month or less.
• When Americans do have sex, it is largely monogamous- 83% have one or zero partners a year and over a lifetime, a man typically has six partners and a woman only two.
• Contrary to popular opinion, married people have more sex and better sex than singles. Nearly 40% of marrieds claim they have sex at least twice a week, while only 25% of singles make the same claim. Also, marrieds are more likely to enjoy sex.
• Once again contrary to popular belief, adultery is not as common as believed. 75% of men and 85% of women claim to have never been unfaithful.
• When they do have sex, Americans tend to be unimaginative and boring. The most popular activity is vaginal sex, followed by “watching their partner undress, and followed in a very distant third, by oral sex.
• Sexual acts tend to be influenced by racial and religious differences. For example, 80% of white college-educated males have had oral sex, but only about 50% of Blacks have. On a personal note, I have met two different black females who told me that they refuse to give oral sex, so I think there must be something there in their culture. Also, Roman Catholics are most likely to be virgins, while Jews are most likely to have the most sex partners.
• Of those, who have had more than 21 sex partners, most are in the boomer generation, who grew up in the 60s and 70s and before AIDS.
• And also, there are surprisingly less gays than we suspected- only 2.7% of men and 1.3% of women admitted to having a homosexual experience in the past year.

So what all of this means, if true, is that our culture is a lot more sexually conservative and less inhibited than it has been in the past. A lot of this can be attributed to the AIDS epidemic as well as the resurgence of religious revivalism in the Bible Belt. However, similar studies in England and France also showed low rates of homosexuality and high rates of marital fidelity. In fact, the only striking differences between the US and the French was that the French have far more sex than we do- twice as much. However, it still tends to be more of the monogamous, faithful type. Of course, there may be some inaccuracies due to participants choosing to conceal information, such as not revealing that they are homosexual if in fact they are. However, with our culture opening up, and homosexuality out of the closet and more in the mainstream, I would suspect that that kind of concealment would be less pronounced than in times past.

Interestingly enough, this study initially had public funding, then was shut down by conservative forces in government, only to have a second life again due to private donors. Just goes to show you how uptight this country really is. More details of this study can be found here- The Truth About Americans and Sex.

Update: A new study just released by the makers of Trojan Brand condoms finds that Americans have sex on average 84 times a year, or 7 times a month. That includes all the hypersexual couples having sex daily and all those who never have sex all year at all.  As far as I’m concerned, 84 is just an abysmally low number, which just gives more credence to the other study above. Info about the Trojan study- HERE.