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Puberty is starting earlier for many children

– sex education must catch up with this new reality

Some girls as young as six and seven are showing the early signs of puberty.

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The British government is consulting on a new curriculum for sex and relationship education in English schools. This change provides a timely opportunity to update how, when and what children are taught about puberty.

Astonishingly, the Department for Education (DfE) guidance on sex education has not changed for nearly two decades. But after concerted lobbying, research, and the recommendations of multiple committees of MPs, in 2017, the Children and Social Work Act finally acknowledged the need to provide “sex education for the 21st century”.

New statutory guidance for schools will be published following the public consultation, which closes in mid February. From 2019, secondary schools will be obliged to offer relationships and sex education, and primary schools to offer relationships education. Parents will retain the right to remove their children from sex education – other than that which is covered in the science curriculum – but will not be allowed to remove them from relationships education.

These changes are underpinned by widespread concern about the negative effects of digital technologies on young people’s sexual lives, particularly sexting, child sexual abuse and exploitation, and “strangers online”. The new curriculum will, it seems, teach children and young people what healthy relationships look like in the fraught context of smart phones, online porn and Instagram.

The new puberty

But the new curriculum should also take account of what is happening to the bodies of young people in the 21st century. Not only do kids seem to be growing up much faster today, many of them are actually starting to develop physically earlier than ever before.

According to many scientists and clinicians, we are living in the era of “the new puberty” in which increasing numbers of girls start to develop sexually at age seven or eight. In the 1960s, only 1% of girls would enter puberty before their ninth birthday. Today, up to 40% of some populations in both rich and poor countries are doing so.

Sexual development is also being stretched out for longer, with many girls starting to grow breasts and pubic hair two to three years before they have their first period. While there is less evidence that boys’ development is changing so rapidly, some studies also indicate that earlier entry into puberty’s initial stages is becoming more common.

The causes of these changes remain unclear. Many scientists point to the simultaneous increase in childhood obesity, while others study the effects of environmental chemicals, such as Bisphenol A or BPA (which is found in some plastics), on the body. Other research has explored the effects of social factors, including family structures, experiences of early life trauma and socioeconomic disadvantage. This range of explanations points to how complex a phenomenon puberty is.

The current DfE guidance states that:

All children, including those who develop earlier than the average, need to know about puberty before they experience the onset of physical changes.

But it leaves schools to decide, in consultation with parents, “the appropriate age” to teach children about puberty. In 2017, the Personal, Social and Health Education Association argued that this should be when they’re age seven. But talking to seven-year-olds about breasts, pubic hair, body odour and genital changes may not be easy for many teachers, or for many parents. Being seven is supposed to be a time of freedom, play and innocence.

Getting ready for puberty.

Updating sex education

Children who develop early, present a challenge both to cultural thinking about sex and to sex education policy. While many parents and young people want updated sex education, this usually comes with the proviso that such education be “age appropriate”. Although very important, this phrase is painfully vague – and it’s unclear whether it refers to chronological age, emotional age or stage of physical development.

Today, some seven-year-olds may be emotionally young but also starting to grow breasts and pubic hair. Other early developers who have experienced early life stress – such as abandonment or abuse – may feel more mature than their peers and be ready earlier to learn about puberty and sexuality. The widening gap in the timing of boys’ and girls’ sexual development also poses a challenge. Teaching girls separately, or earlier than boys – the strategy in my own child’s primary school – risks reinforcing harmful gender norms and notions of secrecy around issues such as menstruation.

Instead, perhaps we could try to disentangle puberty from teenage sexuality and to develop accounts of puberty that do not frame it as the dawn of adolescence. A seven-year-old with breasts is not “becoming a woman”, and a menstruating nine-year-old is probably not going to want to have intercourse anytime soon.

Ultimately, this means moving beyond traditional portrayals of female bodies that focus on reproductive capacity in order to explore wider meanings and experiences of being a girl. Growing up is also about new horizons, such as strength, health, even pleasure. Sex and relationships education might even then include puberty as something to be anticipated, noticed, even celebrated – rather than as yet another risk.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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Why do half of women have fantasies about being raped?

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[T]here’s a wide range of sexual fantasies people have, ranging from entirely unrealistic to applicable to real life, sex with Superman through to banging on a plane.

But the fantasy of being raped, also known as nonconsent and forced sex fantasies, is common.

Sexual fantasies let you explore your sexuality, they’re what we use to get off in those harsh, cold wifi-free winters, and we get to use them in roleplay scenarios to make our sex lives even more fulfilling.

But this common fantasy is one that few of us feel comfortable sharing. It puts people on edge and makes us feel a bit wrong.

Recent research indicates that between 31% and 57% of women have fantasies in which they are forced into sex against their will. For 9% to 17% of those women, rape fantasies are their favourite or most frequent sexual fantasy.

It’s natural if that makes you feel alarmed.

In real-life contexts, rape – meaning sex against your will – is deeply traumatising. It’s not at all ‘sexy’. It’s an intense violation that causes high levels of distress.

Content warning: Those who find discussions of rape and sexual assault may find this article triggering. 

It seems strange that we’d use rape as the basis for our sexual fantasies – and yet so many of us do.

And it’s incredibly important to note that while rape fantasies are common, this does not mean that women secretly want to be raped. There is a huge difference between acted out role-play, imagined scenarios, and real-life experiences. No one asks to be raped, no one deserves to be raped, and how common forced sex fantasies are in no way justifies unwanted sexual contact of any nature.

It’s difficult to know exactly what these fantasies entail, because, well, they’re going on in someone else’s mind.

But the women we spoke to mentioned that their fantasies of forced sex steered away from experiences that would be close to reality.

Rather than lines of consent being crossed by friends or bosses, we fantasise about high drama situations in which we are forced to have sex to survive, entering into sexual contracts rather than having our right to consent taken away from us outright.

Amy*, 26, says a common fantasy is being kidnapped and held hostage, then having one of the guards forcing her into sex to keep her safe.

Tasha, 24, fantasises about thieves breaking into her house and being so attracted to her they have to have sex with her against her will.

In both scenarios, the women said they start out by resisting advances, then begin to enjoy the sex midway through. It’s giving up the fight and giving in to desire that’s the turn on, rather than the very real trauma of real-life rape.

But for other women, fantasies are more true to life. For some it’s not about feigned struggle, but imagining consent and control being ripped away as a major turn on.

Why is this? Why are so many of us aroused by forced sex when we’d be horrified by the reality of it? Why do we find the idea of rejecting sex then doing it anyway a turn on?

Dr Michael Yates, clinical psychologist at the Havelock Clinic, explains that there are a few theories.

The first is that women’s fantasies of nonconsensual sex are down to lingering guilt and shame around female sexuality.

‘For centuries (and sadly still all too regularly today), young women are taught to hide sexual feelings or encouraged to fit narrow gender stereotypes of the acceptable ways that female sexuality can be expressed in society,’ Michael tells Metro.co.uk. ‘As a result sex and sexual feelings are often accompanied by anxiety, guilt or shame.

‘One theory is that rape fantasies allow women to reduce distress associated with sex, as they are not responsible for what occurs, therefore have less need to feel guilt or shame about acting upon their own sexual desires or feelings.’

Essentially, lingering feelings of shame around taking agency over our own sexual desires can make us want to transfer them on to another body, thus giving us permission to fantasise about sexual acts. In our minds, it’s not us doing it, it’s all the other person, meaning we don’t have to feel guilty or dirty.

This explains why most rape fantasies don’t tend to be extremely violent, and why the women I asked reported resisting at first before having an enjoyable experience (which real-life rape is definitely not).

‘More often than not, most people who have rape fantasies imagine a passionate scene with very little force, based around the “victim” being so desirable that the “rapist” cannot control themselves, while the victim generally does not feel the terror, confusion, rage and disgust of an actual rape,’ says Michael.

The second theory is down to the dominant narratives shown in media and porn. It’s suggested that because our media and porn so often show men being dominant and losing control around a meek, deeply attractive woman, that’s simply how we envision ideal sex in our fantasies.

Take a flip through classic erotic literature, or even just look at the covers, and you’ll be confronted by strong men grabbing weak, swooning women.

‘Although rarely do these novels portray rape or sexual assault explicitly, they do play into the idea of a female sexual role as succumbing to the dominant role of male sexuality,’ notes Michael. ‘One whereby men can act upon their sexual urges at the point they choose (with the female having little power to object).’

So that might be the why – but what about the who? Does having fantasies about being raped mean anything about us? Are certain types of women more likely to have fantasies of being raped?

As with most sexual fantasies, it’s really not something to panic about.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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A history of sexual depictions in art

‘Sex has been evoked in ways that simultaneously challenge, repress and embrace its notions’

[E]ven though the existence of humankind is dependent on sex, it has always been a taboo topic of discussion.

The entire history of art, from ancient to contemporary, has portrayed sex in very overt ways, bringing the subject of sex into the institution of art museums. Because of the lack of recorded history about sex, these frank depictions of sexuality in art visually uncover the way sexuality was viewed over time. These works of art can help us understand attitudes towards sex as they were transformed and shifted geographically through time.

Studying erotic art exposes the open attitude ancient Romans had towards sex. Statues, frescoes and household decorative items from ancient Rome prove that sex was an integral part of their everyday lives and that they were not afraid to show it.

The Secret Museum in Naples exhibits ancient Roman works of people having sex, phallic statues and beastiality, which is sexual relations between a human and an animal. Although the ancient Romans were seemingly comfortable with sex, the museum is called The Secret Museum because King Naples I of Naples deemed the works inappropriate and demanded they be locked away. Art’s attempts to comfortably illustrate sex have been historically shunned and disapproved because it is considered taboo.

Mesopotamian art (c. 4500-539 BCE), like ancient Roman art, portrayed sex openly. Observing these works reveals the sex customs in the culture as well. For example, it was a custom for every woman to perform a specific type of prostitution at least once in their life. This ritual was for women to sit outside the Temple of Ishtar and have sex with a man who chooses them. Mesopotamian plaques frankly evoke people having sex as well as this ritual of prostitution.

Western culture is particularly known to disapprove of open sexuality. But, Western artists rebelled against this notion, especially with the introduction of Modernism. Prior to what we call Modern art (1860s-1970s), was the Renaissance in Europe. Renaissance art is typically more discrete with depictions of sex and sexuality. Because it is inspired by classical antiquity, nudity is common among the works. This portrayal of nudity is not shunned because it depicts religious figures and figures of the past.

As a response to urbanization and industrialization, Modern art took a major turn from classical antiquity, which created a shift in subject matter. This introduced illustrations of what were contemporary figures rather than ancient ones. Suddenly, sex and nudity were deemed inappropriate and tasteless. Modern artists have intentions of being radical, disregarding this response to their work.

Modern artists in Europe explored how the rapid urbanization and industrialization of the time period commodified sex and alienated figures of the modern. Egon Schiele frankly depicts sex to address this condition of modernism in his work “Two Women Embracing” (1915). The drawing portrays two women being sexually intimate in front of a blank background.

Although the figures are embracing, the perspective and the background make them appear as if they are floating in a space of loneliness and alienation. This melancholy feeling of isolation that stems from modernization is a condition that Modern artists repeatedly evoked. Schiele expresses this feeling through a depiction of sex to elicit that even in the highest forms of intimacy, feelings of loneliness exist.

“Two Women Embracing” and the rest of Schiele’s works were extremely radical for the time. In fact, Schiele was forced to spend time in jail as a pornographer. His frank representations of sexuality were so incredibly radical because of his depictions of modern subjects and lesbianism. Schiele revolutionarily instigated a discussion about sex and sexuality in the Western world where it had been neglected and shunned.

Following Modern art is what we call Contemporary art, which was produced from the late 20th century to the 21st century today. Performance art was a medium introduced with Contemporary art. The medium aimed to create a bodily encounter between the artist and the viewer. Many performance artists took advantage of the live relationship between artist and viewer to bring sex into their workplace.

A lot of performance art would be considered abject art — art that works to introduce the bodily functions that are silenced and taboo into the museum. When a viewer encounters an abject work of art, they are forced to think about their own body and what they repress everyday. Abject artists oftentimes work with the concept of sex in an attempt to dismantle its history as something forbidden and address issues about sex and sexuality.

Vito Acconci’s abject work titled “Seedbed” (1972) encounters the viewer in a shocking and vulnerable way. It was a performance piece in which Acconci said sexual comments to the audience members walking past a little wooden square in the corner of a museum. During the performance, he hid under a ramp so the viewers could hear his vulgar comments out of a speaker yet they could not see him. Under the ramp, Acconci was masturbating to those who encountered the wooden square. By making the repressed sexual act of masturbation a public performance, Acconci attempted to break stigmas about sex while simultaneously addressing issues of sexual objectification.

The Contemporary artist Carolee Schneemann evoked sex through performance art as well. In her 1964 performance “Meat Joy,” men and women wrestled sexually with meat in an orgy encounter. She provoked the viewer to look at sex in a profoundly unusual way. Through this seemingly odd performance, Schneemann confronted the audience with this overt sexuality in an attempt to reject the notion that sex should be repressed.

Throughout the history of art, sex has been evoked in ways that simultaneously challenge, repress and embrace its notions. From ancient art to contemporary, artists have continuously worked to make sex a comfortable topic that should be embraced and addressed openly.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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Children raised by same-sex parents do as well as their peers, study shows

Comprehensive review in Medical Journal of Australia concludes main threat to same-sex parented children is discrimination

 

Rainbow Families lobbying against a plebiscite on same-sex marriage in September 2016.

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[A]s the marriage equality vote draws toward its close, a comprehensive study published in the Medical Journal of Australia shows children raised in same-sex-parented families do as well as children raised by heterosexual couple parents.

The review of three decades of peer-reviewed research by Melbourne Children’s found children raised in same-sex-parented families did as well emotionally, socially and educationally as their peers.

The study’s findings will undercut one of the arguments that have been used by the No campaign: that children need both a mother and a father to flourish.

The study’s authors said their work aimed to put an end to the misinformation about children of same-sex couples and pointed out that the results had been replicated across independent studies in Australia and internationally.

Titled The Kids are OK: it is Discrimination Not Same-Sex Parents that Harms Children, the report comes as the postal survey voting period enters its final days. Votes must be received by the Australian Bureau of Statistics by November 7 and outcome will be announced on November 15. So far polling has indicated that the Yes campaign is headed for a convincing win.

Among the studies reviewed were the 2017 public policy research portal at Columbia Law School, which reviewed 79 studies investigating the wellbeing of children raised by gay or lesbian parents; a 2014 American Sociological Association review of more than 40 studies, which concluded that children raised by same-sex couples fared as well as other children across a number of wellbeing measures; and the Australian Institute of Family Studies’ 2013 review of the Australian and international research, which showed there was no evidence of harm.

“The findings of these reviews reflect a broader consensus within the fields of family studies and psychology. It is family processes – parenting quality, parental wellbeing, the quality of and satisfaction with relationships within the family) – rather than family structures that make a more meaningful difference to children’s wellbeing and positive development,” the researchers said.

The researchers said that studies reporting poor outcomes had been widely criticised for their methodological limitations. For example the widely quoted Regnerus study compared adults raised by a gay or lesbian parent in any family configuration with adults who were raised in stable, heterosexual, two-parent family environments, which may have distorted the outcomes.

However, the study did find that young people who expressed diversity in their sexual orientation or gender identity experienced some of the highest rates of psychological distress in Australia, said the study’s senior author, Prof Frank Oberklaid.

“Young LGBTIQ+ people are much more likely to experience poor mental health, self-harm and suicide than other young people, “ he said.

“Sadly, this is largely attributed to the harassment, stigma and discrimination they and other LGBTIQ+ individuals and communities face in our society,” Oberklaid said.

He warned that the debate itself had been harmful.

“The negative and discriminatory rhetoric of the current marriage equality debate is damaging the most vulnerable members of our community – children and adolescents. It’s essential that we recognise the potential for the debate about marriage equality to cause harm for our children and young people,” Oberklaid said.

He said there was solid evidence in countries that had legalised same-sex marriage that it had a positive impact on the mental health and wellbeing of same-sex-parented families and LGBTIQ+ young people.

“As part of the medical community we feel a duty of care to all groups in our society, particularly to those who are vulnerable. Our duty extends to making sure that accurate, objective interpretations of the best available evidence are available and inaccuracies are corrected in an effort to reduce the destructiveness of public debate,” Oberklaid said.

He called for an end to the negative messages that could harm children in the final weeks of the voting period.

Melbourne Children’s is made of up of four child health organisations – the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, the Royal Children’s hospital, the University of Melbourne, department of paediatrics and the Royal Children’s Hospital Foundation.

Complete Article HERE!

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Is It Okay To Be Attracted To A Certain Body Type?

By Cory Stieg

[E]arlier this month, an Instagram post by a man named Robbie Tripp went viral (for better or worse) because it was a long tribute to his wife’s “curvy body.” It was hard to miss, between the praise he received from news outlets that said he was the “Husband of the Year,” to others (like this one) that criticized him for fetishizing fat women and said he missed the point of feminism.

While the post as a whole is epically maddening, it does bring up an interesting question: Is it okay to be attracted to a certain body type? That’s complicated, and you have to look at where desire and attraction come from in the first place, says Sheila Addison, PhD, LMFT, a sex-positive couples’ therapist who focuses on size acceptance. Desire is a feeling that happens on an unconscious level, so in a sense, it can’t be controlled, Dr. Addison says. And the way that we perceive our own feelings about desire is shaped by what we see in our world as normal and desirable, plus our own values and opinions, she says.

When people talk about having a “type” it’s more difficult to brush that off as just a side effect of imposed desire. “On the one hand, feelings do what they do, and there are no illogical feelings,” Dr. Addison says. But people do tend to have illogical thoughts about their desires, which can lead to fetishizing, she says. For example, some people might believe that they will only date tall people, when in reality they just happen to be more attracted to taller individuals. Because we’re human beings who like patterns, there’s a temptation to “fall into shorthand” and just say you have a type, Dr. Addison says. That would mean, following the same example, that you never talk to shorter people when you’re out; or that you try to notice a person’s height before engaging in a conversation to get to know them. In doing this, you’ve excluded them from the conversation, and only checked off your “yes, tall” requirement. Problematic!

This line of thinking becomes problematic when it prevents someone from expanding their horizons and connecting with anyone outside of their type, Dr. Addison says. “You get comfortable with just letting [desire] flow along the channel that it’s carved out up to now,” she says. And if your channel is extremely well-worn, so to speak, take a beat to consider the difference between having a “type” you tend to be attracted to, and fetishizing people who fit a certain characterization.

From a mental health perspective, there is a clear line between a type and a fetish, Dr. Addison says. “Psychiatrists have decided that the dividing line is that fetishes really become the center of the sexual act or the sexual desire, as opposed to the person,” she says. So, instead of being interested in a person, you’d be interested in their body alone, if you had a body-focused fetish. “At that point, your world of desire has really narrowed down to whatever it is you’re fetishizing,” she says.

Fetish doesn’t automatically equal objectification, though, and there are certainly ways partners can safely enjoy a fetish with mutual consent. “When it comes to having fetishes for types of people, I think that is one where it can get difficult somewhat quickly,” Dr. Addison adds — because a fetish is putting something specific before the actual person. This can make sex, or a whole relationship, feel somewhat transactional, she says. In Tripp’s post, for example, he neglected to even mention his wife’s name until the very end, after remarking on several parts of her body.

“For me, there is nothing sexier than this woman right here: thick thighs, big booty, cute little side roll, etc.,” he wrote. What about, I don’t know, her personality or literally anything else about her? This is why a Refinery29 writer, and so many others, characterized Tripp’s comments as fetishization — yes, it was his own wife he was talking about; and no, we can’t know how she feels about this line of thinking, but he had removed her humanity to praise, pick apart, and point out the physical pieces of her that excite him. When people are fetishized for their bodies, it tips the balance of power and control in a relationship.

“There’s this cultural idea that fat people, particularly fat women, cannot find love just on their own merit, or cannot find people who love and adore them as total people,” Dr. Addison says. Plenty of people completely reject that idea, but others still find it incredibly painful. “Those people are potentially vulnerable to someone who is offering attention that is really coming from a place of a fetish, but in the guise of a relationship,” she says. Having someone be sexually aroused by your body can feel really good at first, but if you’re hoping it will turn into a reciprocal, mutual relationship, then you may be setting yourself up for disappointment.

So, what’s the solution for this? We tend to forget that desire is actually expandable, Dr. Addison says. Tripp’s post actually included a call to action for guys to, “rethink what society has told you that you should desire.” This is a good point, but it’s also a little beside the point. Yes, question anytime society is telling you what you “should” look like, or be attracted to in others. But also question your own desires, especially if you find yourself being held back by them. “The people who get most uncomfortable with conversations about this are those who are uncomfortable with looking at how learned values and learned aesthetics really do play into who or what appeals to us,” Dr. Addison says. And the time you find yourself scanning the room for the tallest person in sight, for example, consider taking a beat to think about why.

Complete Article HERE!

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Drinking Alcohol Makes Straight Men More Sexually Fluid

‘Beer Goggles’ Boost Physical Attraction To Same Sex

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Many of us are all too familiar with the “beer goggles” effect: friends and strangers alike become more attractive after a drink or two. Undoubtedly, drinking alcohol lowers our inhibitions and makes us more open to experimentation with the same sex. In a new study, published in The Journal of Social Psychology, straight men were found to be more physically attracted to other men after a few drinks.

“Most notably, alcohol intake was related to increased sexual willingness of men with a same-sex partner, suggesting a potential shift in normative casual sexual behavior among heterosexual men,” wrote the authors in the study.

Researchers recruited a total of 83 straight men and women who were bar hopping in the Midwest at night. The participants were asked to complete a survey about how many drinks they’d had that night. In addition, they had to watch a 40-second video of either a physically attractive man or woman drinking at a bar and chatting with the bartender. Then, the participants rated their sexual interest in the person in the video, from buying them a drink to going home together to have sex.

Unsurprisingly, men showed high interest when the attractive woman was on the screen; women naturally were more attracted to the man. Moreover, men were more likely to make sexual comments about the woman after the video. Overall, they expressed more sexual interest in the women, regardless of how much they had. This coincides with previous research that concedes men tend to be more lax about casual sex with strangers.

However, the researchers noted an interesting observation: the more alcohol men drank, the more interested they became in the man in the video. Men who had nothing to drink showed no interest. Those who consumed over 10 alcoholic drinks were more likely to entertain the idea of gay sex just as much as having sex with a woman.

“Sexual willingness was only influenced by alcohol intake and perceived attractiveness of a same-sex prospective partner,” the authors wrote.

In women, the more alcohol they drank, the more interested they were in other women, and the opposite sex.

This suggests sexuality for men and women does not fall under straight and gay, but instead is fluid. A 2016 study found women have been evolutionarily designed to have same-sex encounters. The researchers proposed women’s sexuality has evolved to be more fluid than men’s as a mechanism to reduce conflict and tension among co-wives in polygynous marriages.

In men, studies have found a large number of straight men watch gay porn and even have gay sexual fantasies. Researchers believe homosexuality has evolved in humans because it helps us bond with one another. In other words, sexual behavior is not a means to an end of reproduction, but it can also be used to help form and maintain social bonds.

It’s no surprise drinking alcohol leads to sexual behavior, and even makes us sexually fluid, and less inhibited. Alcohol’s influence on specific brain circuits has led us to feel euphoric and less anxious. It makes us more empathetic and leads us to see other people — even the same sex — as more attractive.

Alcohol may allow us to freely express our sexual side, without judgment or reservations.

Complete Article HERE!

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Why Aftercare Is The BDSM Practice That Everyone Should Be Doing

By Sophie Saint Thomas

[I]f you’re unfamiliar with the BDSM scene, you might think it’s all whips, handcuffs, and pleasurable pain, but there’s one important element that BDSM practitioners have built into their sex lives to make sure that everyone involved feels safe and cared for after play time is over: a practice known as aftercare. And whether you’re into BDSM or have more vanilla tastes, aftercare is something everyone should be doing.

In the BDSM world, aftercare refers to the time and attention given to partners after an intense sexual experience. While these encounters (or “scenes,” as they’re called) are pre-negotiated and involve consent and safe words (in case anyone’s uncomfortable in the moment), that doesn’t mean that people can forget about being considerate and communicative after it’s all over. According to Galen Fous, a kink-positive sex therapist and fetish sex educator, aftercare looks different for everyone, since sexual preferences are so vast. But, in its most basic form, aftercare means communicating and taking care of one another after sex to ensure that all parties are 100% comfortable with what went down. That can include everything from tending to any wounds the submissive partner got during the scene, to taking a moment to be still and relish the experience, Fous says.

Specifically, with regards to BDSM, the ‘sub-drop’ is what we are hoping to cushion [during aftercare],” says Amanda Luterman, a kink-friendly psychotherapist. A “sub-drop” refers to the sadness a submissive partner may feel once endorphins crash and adrenaline floods their body after a powerful scene (though dominant partners can also experience drops, Fous says).

Of course, you don’t have to be hog-tied and whipped to feel sad after sex. One 2015 study found that nearly 46% of the 230 women surveyed felt feelings of tearfulness and anxiety after sex — which is known as “postcoital dysphoria” — at least once in their lives (and around 5% had experienced these feelings a few times in the four weeks leading up to the study). Experts have speculated that this may stem from the hormonal changes people (particularly those with vaginas) experience after orgasm, but many also say that it can come from feeling neglected. The so-called “orgasm gap” suggests that straight women, in particular, may feel that their needs in bed are ignored. And Luterman says that people in general can also feel lousy post-sex if they’re not communicating about what they liked and didn’t like about the experience.

Clearly, taking the time to be affectionate and talk more after sex — a.k.a. aftercare — can make sex better for everyone, not just those who own multiple pairs of handcuffs. So what does that mean for you? It depends on the kind of sex you’re having, and who you’re having it with.

Taking the time to be affectionate and talk more after sex — a.k.a. aftercare — can make sex better for everyone, not just those who own multiple pairs of handcuffs.

Like we said, there are lots of guidelines for BDSM aftercare, specifically. If you’re having casual sex, aftercare can mean simply letting your guard down and discussing the experience, something that can be scary to do during a one-night stand. It’s definitely dependent on the situation, but Luterman says that you can just express that you had a good time and see if they’re interested in seeing you again (if those are thoughts you’re actually having). “People want to be reminded that they still are worthwhile, even after they’ve been sexually gratifying to the person,” Luterman says. If your experience didn’t go well, it’s important to voice that, too.

And those in long-term relationships are certainly not exempt from aftercare, Luterman says. It’s something couples should continue to do, especially after trying something new (such as anal sex), she says. Did the sex hurt? Do they want to do it again? What did they like and not like about it? You can’t know what your partner is thinking unless you ask them. Plus, it can be easy for long-term partners to feel taken for granted, so making sure to cuddle, stroke each other’s hair, and savor the moment after sex can make even the most routine sex feel special.

One thing we should all keep in mind? It can also be helpful to continue these conversations when everyone’s vertical (and clothed) and any post-orgasm high has faded.

At the end of the day, aftercare is just a fancy term for making sure everyone’s happy once the sex is over. And while communication needs to be happening before and during sex as well, having these discussions afterwards comes with an added bonus: You can learn from the experience so that the sex is even hotter the next time.

Complete Article HERE!

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The Swinging Over-Sixties: most older couples are happy with their sex lives

By Katie Grant

[I]t is a common assumption that once a couple ties the knot, sex goes out the window. Indeed, the actress Zsa Zsa Gabor, who said “I do” nine times, once quipped: “I know nothing about sex, because I was always married”.

Yet new research indicates that most couples in long-term relationships remain happy well into their sixties.

While it is not uncommon for couples to disagree about how often they should have sex, this does not necessarily alter their commitment to the relationship, scientists at the British Sociological Association’s annual conference in Manchester will hear on Wednesday.

Levels of sexual desire

Researchers surveyed more than 5,000 heterosexual, lesbian, gay and bisexual people aged 16 to 65 to discuss their relationships.

Around 60 per cent of respondents believed that sex was an important part of their relationship while 15 per cent disagreed. The remainder neither agreed nor disagreed.

One third (33 per cent) of women reported that their partners wanted sex more frequently than they did, while a larger proportion, 40 per cent, said this was not the case.

Only 10 per cent of men said that their partners wanted sex more frequently than they did, compared with nearly two thirds (60 per cent) who said they did not.

‘Part and parcel’ of relationship cycle

The research, conducted by Professor Jacqui Gabb, of the Open University, and Professor Janet Fink, of the University of Huddersfield, and presented in Manchester on Wednesday, reveals that differences in sexual desire are not considered “particularly significant”.

“Couples are saying that differences in sexual frequency and desire are just part and parcel of the relationship cycle and are accepted as not particularly significant,” Professor Gabb said.

Still going strong

The study also found that many older participants continued to derive pleasure from their sex lives even when sexual activity was less frequent than it had once been.

One older woman who participated in the research described sex as “one of the prerequisites of a relationship” for her.

However, she added: “There are other areas of a relationship which I think need a lot more work and are far more important, like trust, money, love [and] teamwork.”

Long-term love

Professor Gabb said of the findings: “Fluctuations in desire are inexorably tied into other life factors, but it is the sharing of a life together, the investment in that joint venture and the acceptance of change as an integral part of this shared life which enables couples to weather the ebbs and flows that characterise sexual intimacy and the passage of time in long-term relationships.”

She added: “The longevity of partnerships seems to be connected with couples’ capacity to negotiate changing circumstances. For older couples, the first blush of a new relationship may have worn off but the relationship has not tarnished.”

Complete Article HERE!

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Does Progesterone Influence Baby’s Later Sexuality?

By Rick Nauert PhD

[A] new study addresses whether supplementing progesterone during pregnancy, a common practice to prevent miscarriage, could influence a baby’s sexual orientation in later life.

Dr. June Reinisch, director emerita of the Kinsey Institute in the U.S., led the study. She found that bisexuality is quite common among men and women whose mothers received additional doses of the sex hormone progesterone while pregnant.

As discussed in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, researchers tracked the sexual development of 34 Danes whose mothers were treated with the hormone to prevent miscarriage.

According to the investigators, progesterone appears to be an underappreciated factor influencing the normal development of variations in human sexuality and psychosexuality.

Researchers believe the findings warrant further investigation given that little is known about the effects on offspring of natural variations in levels of maternal progesterone and that progesterone is widely used to treat pregnancy complications.

Men and women all naturally produce the sex hormone progesterone. It is involved in women’s menstrual cycles, and helps to maintain pregnancies and development of the fetus.

Progesterone plays a role in neural development and the production of other sex hormones as well as steroid hormones that help to regulate stress responses, inflammation, and metabolism in the body.

Physicians often prescribe progesterone and its bio-versions to support the fertilization process, to prevent miscarriages or premature births, or to increase babies’ birth weights.

The 34 participants in the study were drawn from the Copenhagen Perinatal Cohort, which comprises information collected from virtually all children born between 1959 and 1961 at the university hospital in Copenhagen, Denmark.

The 17 men and 17 women were selected because their mothers exclusively received the progesterone lutocyclin to prevent a miscarriage.

These men and women were compared with a carefully selected control group who were not exposed prenatally to lutocyclin or any other hormone medication, but who otherwise matched the study participants based on 14 relevant physical, medical, and socioeconomic factors.

The participants were all in their mid-20s when asked about their sexual orientation, self-identification, attraction to each sex, and sexual history using questionnaires and a structured interview with a psychologist.

It was found that men and women whose mothers were treated with progesterone were significantly less likely to describe themselves as heterosexual. One in every five (20.6 percent) of the progesterone- exposed participants labeled themselves as other than heterosexual.

Compared to the untreated group, the chances were greater that by their mid-20s they had already engaged in some form of same-sex sexual behavior (in up to 24.2 percent of cases), and that they were attracted to the same (29.4 percent) or to both sexes (17.6 percent). Both exposed males and females also had higher scores related to attraction to men.

“Progesterone exposure was found to be related to increased non-heterosexual self-identification, attraction to the same or both sexes, and same-sex sexual behavior,” says Reinisch.

“The findings highlight the likelihood that prenatal exposure to progesterone may have a long-term influence on behavior related to sexuality in humans.”

The research team believes further studies on the offspring of women medically treated with progesterone and other progestogens during their pregnancies are necessary. Additionally, studies examining the effects of natural variation in prenatal progesterone levels are warranted to provide more insight into the role that this hormone plays in the development of human behavior.

Complete Article HERE!

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Why men and women lie about sex, and how this complicates STD control

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[W]hen it comes to reporting the number of sex partners or how often they have sexual intercourse, men and women both lie. While men tend to overreport it, women have a tendency to underreport it. Although the story is not that simple and clear-cut, I have discovered some interesting reasons why this is the case – and why it matters to doing research on sexual health.

Lying is an inherent aspect of reporting sexual behaviors. For instance, more females report being a virgin (i.e., had not had sexual intercourse) despite having had genital contact with a partner, compared to males.

I have studied sexual avoidance and also frequency of sex in patient populations. In this regard I have always been interested in gender differences in what they do and what they report. This is in line with my other research on gender and sex differences.

The low validity and usefulness of self-reported sexual behavior data is very bad news for public health officials. Sexual behavior data should be both accurate and reliable, as they are paramount for effective reproductive health interventions to prevent HIV and STD. When men and women misreport their sexual behaviors, it undermines program designers’ and health care providers’ ability to plan appropriately.

Pregnant virgins, and STDs among the abstinent

A very clear example is the proportion of self-reported virginal status among pregnant women. In a study of multi-ethnic National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, also known as Add Health, a nationally representative study of American youth, 45 women of 7,870 women reported at least one virgin pregnancy.

Another example is the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) which are not expected among young adults reporting sexual abstinence. Yet more than 10 percent of young adults who had a confirmed positive STD reported abstaining from any sexual intercourse in the last year before STD testing.

If we ask youth who have had sexual experience, only 22 percent of them report the same date of first sex the second time we ask about it. On average, people revise their (reported) age at first sex to older ages the second time. Boys have higher inconsistency reporting their first sex compared to females. Males are more likely than females to give inconsistent sexual information globally.

Why don’t people tell the truth about sex?

Why do people lie about their sexual behavior? There are many reasons. One is that people underreport stigmatized activities, such as having multiple sexual partners among women. They overreport the normative ones, such as higher frequency of sex for men. In both cases, people think their actual behavior would be considered socially unacceptable. This is also called social desirability or social approval bias.

Social desirability bias causes problems in health research. It reduces reliability and validity of self-reported sexual behavior data. Simply said, social desirability helps us look good.

As gender norms create different expectations about socially acceptable behavior of men and women, males and females face pressures in reporting certain (socially accepted) behaviors.

In particular, self-reports on premarital sexual experience is of poor quality. Also self-reports of infidelity are less valid.

Although most studies suggest these differences are due to the systematic tendency of men and women to exaggerate and hide their number of partners, there are studies that suggest much of this difference is driven by a handful of men and women who grossly inflate and underreport their sexual encounters.

Even married couples lie

Men and women also lie when we ask them who is making sexual decisions regarding who has more power when it comes to sexual decision-making.

We do not expect disagreement when we ask the same question from husbands and wives in the same couples. But, interestingly, there is a systematic disagreement. More interestingly, in most cases when spouses disagree, husbands are more likely to say “yes” and wives “no.” The findings are interpreted in terms of gendered strategies in the interview process.

Not all of the gender differences in reported sexual behaviors are due to men’s and women’s selective under- and over- reporting of sexual acts. And, some of the sexual behaviors do vary by gender. For instance, men have more sex than women, and men less commonly use condoms. Men have more casual partners, regardless of the validity of their report.

Secretive females, swaggering males

Studies have found that on average, women report fewer nonmarital sexual partners than men, as well as more stable longer relationships. This is in line with the idea that in general men “swagger” (i.e., exaggerate their sexual activity), while women are “secretive” (i.e., underreport sex).

Structural factors such as social norms shape men’s and women’s perceptions of appropriate sexual behaviors. Society expects men to have more sexual partners, and women to have fewer sexual partners.

According to the sexual double standard, the same sexual behavior is judged differently depending on the gender of the (sexual) actor (Milhausen and Herold 2001). Interestingly, men are more likely to endorse a double standard than women.

In the presence of sexual double standards, males are praised for their sexual contacts, whereas females are derogated and stigmatized for the same behaviors, “He’s a Stud, She’s a Slut.”

Research suggests that lifetime sexual partnerships affect peer status of genders differently. A greater number of sexual partners is positively correlated with boys’ peer acceptance, but negatively correlated with girls’ peer acceptance.

Self-serving bias is common

As humans, self-serving bias is a part of how we think and how we act. A common type of cognitive bias, self-serving bias can be defined as an individual’s tendency to attribute positive events and attributes to their own actions but negative events and attributes to others and external factors. We report on sexual behaviors which are normative and accepted to protect ourselves, and avoid stress and conflict. That will reduce our distinction from our surroundings, and will help us feel safe.

As a result, in our society, men are rewarded for having a high number of sexual partners, whereas women are penalized for the same behavior.

The only long-term solution is the ongoing decline in “double standard” about sexual morality. Until then, researchers should continue questioning the accuracy of their data. Computerized interviews may be only a partial solution. Increasing privacy and confidentiality is another partial solution.

Complete Article HERE!

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Men feel sad after sex too, say researchers

Post-coital blues is a real thing

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[W]hile orgasms are (rightly) highly sought after, feeling an unexplainable sadness after sex is something a lot of women experience sometimes. But what many people don’t realise is that the same thing can happen to men.

A group of researchers at Queensland University of Technology suggest that making love can make men occassionally depressed. So depressed in fact, that they suffer something called post-coital dysphoria (PCD).

“Everyone assumes what happens in the bedroom is normal but there are a wide range of responses in the period of time immediately following consensual sexual activity, known as the resolution phase,” explains Robert Schweitzer, study author and a professor at QUT.

“For example, some people like to cuddle, others like to be alone and there are others, as we have found in previous research that experience what is described as post-sex blues.”

He noted that most of the time, the period just after sex elicits good feelings. But it’s also pretty common for some individuals to feel melancholy or tearful after the act.

While researchers seem stumped about the true cause of PCD, some suggest post-sex blues could be the result of negative emotions coming to the surface after an orgasm (or lack of one). But Schwitzer is determined to find out for sure. He’s now recruiting participants for a new study which will survey men and women (of all sexual orientations) to explore their experience directly after sex.

“There is anecdotal evidence that postcoital dysphoria is not uncommon in both men and women. If we can better understand what is happening in the bedroom and the prevalence of post-sex blues, we can start looking at causes and possible solutions,” he added.

Complete Article HERE!

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Why queer history?

By Jennifer Evans

[F]ifteen years ago, as a junior scholar, I was advised not to publish my first book on the persecution of gay men in Germany. And now, one of the major journals in the field has devoted an entire special issue to the theme of queering German history. We have come a long way in recognising the merits of the history of sexuality–and same-sex sexuality by extension–as integral to the study of family, community, citizenship, and human rights. LGBT History Month provides a moment of reflection about struggles past and present affecting the LGBT communities. But it also allows us a moment to think collectively, as a discipline, about the methods and practices of history-making that have opened space to new lines of inquiry, rendering new historical actors visible in the process. In asking the question “why queer history? ” not only do we think about how we got here and the merits of doing this kind of work, but we question, too, whether such recuperative approaches always lead to more expansive, inclusive history. In other words, to queer history is not just to add more people to the historical record, it is a methodological engagement with how knowledge over the past is generated in the first place.

The great social movements of the 20th century created conditions for new kinds of historical claims making as working and indigenous people, women, and people of colour demanded that their stories be told. Social history, and later the cultural turn, provided the tools for the job. Guided by a politics of inclusivity, this first wave of analyses by scholars like the extraordinary John Boswell searched out evidence of a historical gay and lesbian identity–even marriage–in the early modern and medieval period. Michel Foucault’s History of Sexuality vol. 3 would fundamentally alter the playing field, as he questioned the veracity of such quests, arguing that it said far more about our contemporary need for redress than about history itself. Modern homosexual identity–he instructed historians –first emerged in the 19th century through the rise of modern medical and legal mechanisms of regulation and control. The discipline was turned on its head. Instead of detail-rich studies of friendship, “marriage”, and kinship a whole new subfield emerged focused around the penal code, policing, and deviance. In the process of unmasking the mechanisms of power that circumscribed the life of the homosexual, lost from view was the history of pleasure, of love, and even of lust. Although providing a much-needed critique of homophobic institutions, the result was a disproportionate concentration on the coercive modernity of the contemporary age.

And yet, despite these pitfalls, the Foucauldian turn introduced much-needed interdisciplinarity into historical analyses of same-sex practices. Of those who took up the challenge of a critical history of sexuality that sidestepped the pitfalls of finding a fully formed pre-modern identity were medievalists and early modernists keen on questions of periodization and temporality, basically how people in past societies held distinct ways of knowing and being what it meant to live outside the norm. If Foucault had fundamentally destabilised how we understood normalcy and deviance, these scholars wanted to take the discussion further still, to interrogate how the experience of time itself reflected the presumptions and experiences of the heteronormative life course.

By queering history, we move beyond what Laura Doan has called out as the field’s genealogical mooring towards a methodology that might even be used to study non-sexuality topics because of the emphasis on self-reflexivity and critique of overly simplistic, often binary, analyses. A queered history questions claims to a singular, linear march of time and universal experience and points out the unconscious ways in which progressive narrative arcs often seep into our analyses. To queer the past is to view it skeptically, to pull apart its constitutive pieces and analyse them from a variety of perspectives, taking nothing for granted.

This special issue on “Queering German History” picks up here. Keenly attuned to how power manifests as a subject of study in its own right as well as something we reproduce despite our best intentions to right past wrongs, a queer methodology emphasises overlap, contingency, competing forces, and complexity. It asks us to linger over our own assumptions and interrogate the role they play in the past we seek out and recreate in our own writing. To queer history, then, is to think about how even our best efforts of historical restitution might inadvertently circumscribe what is, in fact, discernible in the past despite attempts to make visible alternative ways of being in the world in the present.

Such concerns have profound implications for how we write our histories going forward. Whereas it was once difficult to countenance that LGBT lives might take their rightful place in the canon, the question we still have to account for is whose lives remain obscure while others acquire much-needed attention? While we celebrate how far we’ve come–and it is a huge victory, to be sure–let us not forget there still remains much work to be done.

Complete Article HERE!

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Time for a Sexual Revolution In Health Care Treatment

Why is care for sexual health issues considered a luxury when it’s a necessary part of population health?

By Zachary Hafner

[W]hen Americans seek care for most common health conditions, there is rarely much question about coverage. Every day, consumers—including those on Medicaid and Medicare—seek care for sore joints, depression, and even acne without worrying about whether or not their insurance will cover their doctor visits and medications. For the most part, coverage for sexual health issues is less straightforward—but why? Is it because sexual health issues are not considered legitimate illnesses? Because the costs are significant? Or is it because raising the topic of sexual health can offend certain personal and organizational values? Whatever the reason, it is time for a change.

It’s hard to deny the human and economic burden of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) on this country. The CDC estimates that 110 million Americans are infected with an STI, resulting in direct medical costs of $16 billion annually. The most common and fastest growing STI in this country is human papillomavirus (HPV), and it is estimated that half of sexually active men and women will get HPV at some point in their lives. In 2006, a vaccine for HPV was introduced and now there are several. CDC guidelines recommend administering a multi-dose series, costing about $250–450, to all boys and girls at age 11 or 12. (Some states require the vaccine for school admission.) It was included in mandatory coverage under the ACA. Since the HPV vaccine was first recommended in 2006 there has been a 64% reduction in vaccine-type HPV infections among teen girls in the United States.

It seems clear that this kind of care for sexual health is necessary for public health and is also part of caring for the whole individual, a central tenet of population health. But what about sexual health care that doesn’t involve infectious disease? Is it still a population health issue if there’s no communicable disease involved?

Let’s take erectile dysfunction (ED) for example. It is nearly as common in men over 40 as HPV is in the general population—more than half of men over 40 experience some level of ED, and more than 23 million American men have been prescribed Viagra. With a significant portion of the population suffering from ED, is it important for payers and providers to consider ED treatment to be essential health care and to cover it accordingly? Medications like Viagra and Cialis are an expensive burden at upwards of $50 per pill. Medicare D does not cover any drugs for ED, but some private insurers do when the medications are deemed medically necessary by a doctor. A handful of states require them to do so, but they are typically listed as Tier 3 medications—nonessential and with the highest co-pays.

Almost 7 million American women have used infertility services. Coverage for infertility diagnosis and treatment is not mandated by the ACA, though 15 states require commercial payers to provide various levels of coverage. The cost of infertility treatments is highly variable depending on the methods used but in vitro fertilization treatments, as one measure, average upward of $12,000 per attempt.

Are treatments for ED and infertility elective or necessary? In an age of consumerism and heightened attention to the whole patient across a broader continuum of care, organizations that support the availability of a broad set of sexual health services to a diverse group of consumers will have a big competitive advantage, but they may face challenges balancing the costs. Health care has advanced in both technical and philosophical ways that allow people to manage their diseases, cure their problems, and overcome limitations. It has also shone light on the significant advantages to considering a diagnosis in the context of the whole individual—their social and emotional health as well as coexisting conditions. Studies have shown, for example, that infertility, ED, and STIs all have a significant relationship with depression and anxiety.

It’s time sexual health was folded in to the broader definition of wellness instead of marginalized as a separate issue. For too many Americans, it’s too big an issue not to address.

Complete Article HERE!

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Americans Have Way More Casual Sex and Sexual Partners Than 30 Years Ago

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[T]oday in news that may leave you joyous, exuberant, and otherwise rapt with passion: All the numbers point to Americans having lots and lots more sex than they used to — at least according to this infographic produced by sex psychologist Dr. Justin Lehmiller, based off research reported to the General Social Survey.

Lehmiller’s chart breaks down how American attitudes and sexual behaviors have shifted in the last 30 years, and if you’re a person who enjoys sex, there’s plenty of reason to be hopeful. Here are the highlights from the Lehmiller’s breakdown:

Sexual partners: Up

The average number of sexual partners increased by more than 57% since the 1980s, from 7 partners on average from 1988-89 to 11 from 2010-12.

Casual sex: Up

The number of Americans who report having had casual sex in the last year jumped by 10%. In the ’80s 26.7% of responders copped to no-strings nookie, compared to 37.9% in 2012. Note that the numbers end with 2012; dating apps have only skyrocketed in popularity and cultural acceptance since then.

Friends with benefits: Up

The amount of acquaintances people report having sex with has also jumped almost 10%. In the ’80s 32.1% of respondents said they’d had sex with a friend in the last year. By the 2010s, that number’s grown to 41.2%.

Regular partners: ‘Bout the same

Not a huge discrepancy on this one. The number of folks who say they get the dirty business on the regular from one partner grew from 92.3% to 93.1%. True love is still on top.

Paying for sex: Still not a thing most people do (or admit to)

This one’s gone up from 1.8% of respondents in the ’80s who said they paid for sex in the past year, to 3.2% — not a significant change.

Attitudes have also shifted

Premarital sex and and same sex activity are more widely accepted now than they were before, the chart reports — but teen sex and extramarital sex are still far more likely to be seen as “Always Wrong.”

All this might not exactly be surprising in the age of Tinder and wide-release films with names like Sausage Party. American society’s views on sex have come a long way since the time of the AIDS epidemic, and way further since sexual frustration in women was classified as “hysteria.” Despite how depressing the national dialogue on these topics can be sometimes, we’re lucky to live in a time where sex education and conversations about sexuality aren’t nearly as repressed or reductive.

The next time your (well-meaning) friends in relationships give you a hard time about how many Tinder dates you’ve been on this year, point them to this data and tell them to keep stepping.

See the full chart below.

Complete Article HERE!

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Why Sex Is Beneficial To Social And Mental Health; Research Shows

Daily sex is good or bad? Know benefits of kissing and benefits of sex and sex education. Sex is good for health and learns sex benefits.
Sex feels good because it stimulates oxytocin, a brain chemical that produces a calm, safe feeling. Oxytocin flows in apes when they groom each other’s fur. Sheep release oxytocin when they stand with their flock.

By Dante Noe Raquel II

[T]he act of intimate sex has been evolving over millions of years as an apparatus to deliver sperm to eggs and initiate pregnancy. Currently, we look at the social and mental aspects of health benefits that are a importance of consenting sexual relationships, or the pursuit of them.

Sex Brings People Together

Have you ever met big shot who is right for you “on paper”, but when push comes to push their scent seems wrong, or the stimulus isn’t there? Our bodies can tell our minds who we don’t want to be with. Similarly, our bodies can give us strong indications about whether we want to stay close to someone.

Such releases are mostly marked during sexual pleasure and orgasm. The release of these chemicals is thought to promote love and pledge between couples and increase the chance that they stay together. Some research secondary this comes from studies of rodents. For example, female voles have been found to bond to male voles when their copulation with them is paired with an infusion of oxytocin.

In individuals, those couples who have sex less regularly are at greater risk of relationship closure than are friskier couples. But oxytocin is not just good for pair bonding. It is released from the brain into the blood stream in many social conditions, including breastfeeding, singing and most actions that involve being “together” pleasurably. It appears oxytocin plays a role in a lot of group oriented and socially sweet activities, and is implicated in altruism.

Bonobos (a species of apes) appear to take full benefit of the link between harmony and sex, often resolving conflicts or heartening one another by rubbing genitals, copulating, masturbating or performing oral sex on one another. This isn’t somewhat to try during a tense board meeting, but such findings hint at the potential role lovemaking may play in settlement between couples.

Sex Is A Healthy Activity

Sex is a form of isometrics: a fun online calculator can help you analyze how much energy you burned during your last sex session.

People with poor physical or sensitive health are also more likely to have sexual problems. Here connection is hard to establish – healthier people will tend to be “up” for more sex, but it is also likely that the physical workout and bonding benefits conversed by satisfying sex lead to healthier, happier lives.

It’s also thinkable our long, energetic, and physically demanding style of sex evolved to help us evaluate the health of probable long-term partners.

Sex Can Make Us Creative

Some truth-seekers propose art forms such as poetry, music and painting result from our drive to get people in bed with us.

In a culture in which there’s at least some choice obtainable in whom we mate with, rivalry will be fierce. Therefore, we need to display features that will make us striking to those we are attracted to.

In humans, this is believed to result in modest and creative displays, as well as displays of humor. We certainly see indication of the success of this method: musicians, for example, are stereotyped as never lacking a possible mate. Picasso’s most creative and creative periods usually coincided with the arrival of a new mistress on the scene.

Science Says: Go For It

What then does science tell us? Simply put, non-reproductive sex is an motion that can bring natural rewards. It can bring people together, help drive creative endeavors, and pay to good health.

Complete Article HERE!