Sex is everywhere. In advertising, in movies, even on
smartphones.
Sex can also
be beneficial. Many consider it “significant
exercise.” It may give
you an advantage at work. It has so many positive effects, according to a town
official in Sweden, that the official suggested paying municipal workers to
go home and do it.
But there is
one problem: Americans are having less sex.
That goes for
people of all types, regardless of their gender, race, marriage status or the
region in which they live, according to
a new study published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behavior. In fact,
American adults had sex nine fewer times in 2014 than they did in the late
1990s.
From the
early 1990s into the early 2000s, Americans generally had sex from about 60 to
65 times a year, according to the study. But after 2002, Americans appeared to
lose interest. While the decline has been nearly across the board, one group
seems to be pulling everyone else down: married couples.
Married couples generally have sex more often than
single people, but that advantage is declining. Married couples had sex an
average of 56 times a year in 2014, down from 67 in 1989. But more people are
staying single — meaning there is less sex — and the couples who do walk down
the aisle are making fewer trips into the bedroom.
The report
highlighted several cultural changes in recent years that could have
contributed to the decline. Americans have far more options these days for
different kinds of pleasure — like browsing Facebook and social media, playing
video games or watching Netflix.
The adults who were born and grew up during the rise of
portable technology and entertainment, millennials and Generation
Z, are having sex less often than any previous generation, the study found.
So much for the
stereotype of twenty-somethings as sexual deviants in a hookup culture.
Still, there
is no clear reason for the decline, but the report did rule out two
possibilities: longer hours at work and pornography. Americans worker longer
days, but a busy work life was actually connected with higher sexual frequency.
The consumption of pornography, which is now more accessible than ever before,
was also tied with a busier sex life.
Despite all the declines, one age group showed no interest in
slowing down: people over 70. They had sex nearly 11 times during 2014, up from
an average of 9.6 times in 1989.
