Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
A new study reveals what common sense and tradition have taught us for decades and decades: that having loving sex is more meaningful than having sex "to get material goods or to get ahead." Via Hot Air:
Sexual satisfaction is usually thought of in terms of number of orgasms and time spent between the sheets. But a new study finds that a person's reasons for doing the deed can influence how satisfied they are afterward.
The research, reported online Oct. 22 in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, finds that both men and women are more satisfied when having sex out of love and commitment, while mercenary types don't have much fun in bed — having sex to get material goods or to get ahead was associated with a less satisfying experience.
Why are researchers getting paid to point out the obvious? Or has the popular understanding of sex become so warped that we need little reminders like this study from time to time to tell us what sex is really about?
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Aug '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Bingo.
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
This would be a headline Taranto would file under the heading The Lonely Lives of Scientists. I mean, it's mostly psychological, not physical. In the heart and mind, and errr, that's where I'll stop.
Aug '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Clue #1 - article in link went to MSNBC. Pretty sure that sex with Maddow was what they meant by "sex to get material goods or to get ahead was associated with a less satisfying experience."
Well, that's what a friend told me.
Aug '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Emily, with your great looks, un-porn topics like the above, and a toll-charge number, you could make oodles of cash talking wholesome to callers. "Yes, [Name of Caller], fffffamily life would be sooooo wooooonderful..." Let me tell you Emily, we traditionalist bachelor types would go nuts... The banner ads alone would supplement your monthly income quite nicely. Maybe you could work out a deal with Ricochet? (Gee, if you are single and just happen to be in Oklahoma City this weekend, perhaps dinner...)
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
When I debate politics with my liberal friends the one charge I hear over and over again about conservatives concerns their alleged "greed," and I always counter that it is better to be greedy than to be selfish like most liberals. When pressed to explain the difference I point out that greed can be contained to things of monetary worth, while liberal selfishness touches every aspect of life, including (and especially) sex.
When your entire world is centered around your own pleasure and not the ones that love you it's no wonder that they're A) confused and B) miserable.
Feb '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Yes, my reaction was the same as yours-- why does it always take a "study" to confirm the obvious?
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Or even "The Lonely Lives of Academics."
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
haha! Oh David, I'm flattered (I think). I've never thought of going into the anti-porn business--but it does seem to present a world of opportunities, doesn't it? I could read Jane Austen aloud to callers, explain the merits of Victorian morality, ban all mention of feminism, and declare the era of hooking up as obsolete and out of style--but then I suppose that in the best of all possible worlds, you need your enemies as much as your friends.
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
I think we should say "sex" a lot. The Googling value alone...
Oct '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Yes. I don't know how much TV y'all watch, but catch a few episodes of "Two and a Half Men," "Big Bang Theory," or "Bones," where casual, uncommitted sex is placed on a pedestal and worshipped above all other humen activity (which would include, of course, loving and committed sex.)
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
In a psychology class, I recall mention of some study "performed" in the 1970s, I think, in which married couples were found to enjoy sex more when they spent time with each other beforehand and built up to the sex, rather than just jumped straight into it.
I've also read studies which claimed that a hormonal imprinting occurs, physically encouraging a woman to emotionally attach to the man she has sex with. If the woman has sex with multiple partners, the hormonal bond becomes weaker with each new mate.
Unfortunately, my mind's better at concepts than retaining facts, so my memory of both studies is only vague.
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Unfortunately, the idea of instant self-gratification when it comes to sex is very prevalent, especially in high school and college. The more meaningless sex an individual has the more lonely they feel. Then, in an attempt to fill the void of loneliness, they try to have even more sexual conquests. This is a downward spiraling cycle that is hard for a lot of people to escape. In wondering how things got this way, you don't need to look much further than the music they listen to and movies they watch.
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Was that study funded with Simulus funds ?? ;-D
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Well put Josh!
Jul '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Fighting the urge to say something STUUUUUPPPPPIIIIDDDDDD !
Hey Josh I watched "How to train your Dragon" this weekend
Thats was close
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
This particular study was also generally useless, since it only addressed college-aged people. Obviously, not that many marriages would be involved given the age group and the later age of marrying these days.
It also doesn't really control for the fundamental differences between men and women, where men are biochemically-driven and largely visual, while women are primarily emotionally-driven and tactile.
And, speaking of confirming the obvious, look at the Stephen Fry controversy from last week, where both sides were largely speaking correctly, but talking right past each other. Fry was reiterating the obvious, and the outraged feminists were ignoring his modifiers and reiterating what is also obvious.
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
There was a Stephen Fry controversy? Nooo. And I, also will refrain from posting youtubes. But love that guy, almost as much as Hugh Laurie.
May '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
There was an article a few weeks ago on what scientists are learning about the contents of seminal fluid (NOT semen.) It seems as if there are various hormones which A) act like chocolate on the female psyche and b) attune a female to a particular male, encouraging her system to reject seminal fluids from other males. So we are apparently biochemically inclined to enjoy long-term committed sexual relationships. Almost enough to make a body think there is a basis besides stodginess in those traditional relationships.
From what my daughter (the organic biochemistry student) has told me, if you Google seminal fluid and hormones you'd learn plenty.
Aug '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed.
haha! Oh David, I'm flattered (I think). ...but then I suppose that in the best of all possible worlds, you need your enemies as much as your friends. · Nov 8 at 9:35am
Well, of course, choose Option A: Be flattered. For the life of me, I could not decipher the "enemies and friends" comment, but--as some of our others members would likely agree--perhaps I can be dense. Short of your explanation, I can only say: Fear not! It is very difficult to run out of enemies.
Edited on Nov 8, 2010 at 3:08pmAug '10
Re: Turns Out Sex With Love and Commitment is More Meaningful After All
O.K., maybe I'm being overly optimistic, but could the study indicate people are beginning to rediscover truths about human sexuality that were neglected, then denied, then repressed and almost forgotten in the years after 1965?
Maybe the writers for T.V. shows arn't yet aware that viewers are beginning to regain their understanding of themselves as sexual beings.