SEXUAL ATTRACTION: WHAT YOU CAN TELL BY LOOKING
In addition to possible physiological setbacks, which can include illness, family and money problems, there can be misunderstandings all through relationships but particularly at the beginning. Studies of what male college students wanted on a first date compared with what they thought the girls wanted show that they misunderstood each other right from the beginning. Whereas only half the men and women actually wanted or expected to kiss on this first occasion, three-quarters of them thought it was expected. Even studies of engaged and married couples show tremendous areas of misunderstanding, so obviously there is room for a good deal more openness if relationships are to be successful and enjoyable.
Even if the level of communication between two individuals is not all that great there are certain things that one can learn from research and other people’s experiences that help decide on a person’s sexual availability.
Women of all ages are less permissive than men, but up to the age of twenty there is a slight rise reaching a peak then and declining thereafter, especially in those who have children. Women with girls in their late teens are least permissive of all and are only exceeded by the deeply religiously committed.
The way people talk about sex can be revealing but it is a mistake to go entirely by what a person says on the subject. One study, for example, found that attractive girls were more likely to have premarital intercourse but that the attitudes to intercourse they expressed were no different from those expressed by unattractive girls. Similarly, studies of girls from religious families tend to show that they have intercourse younger than girls from non-believing homes yet their upbringing and outward signs would tend to point in the opposite direction.
Kinsey found that women living in urban areas were more sexually experienced. About 60 per cent of American men aged twenty to twenty-two admit to having had premarital intercourse (according to one survey), and the figure is about the same in Germany, Canada and Norway, rising to 75 per cent of English men. The English also lead this chart in ‘one-night stands’, especially among women, a third of whom claimed to have experienced one-night stands as opposed to fewer than 10 per cent in the other countries. The fear of AIDS may have reduced such behaviour recently but probably not to a large extent.
Once we get away from groups of people and consider individual personalities, things become more interesting. For example, studies have found that submissive girls are almost without exception virgins whereas only about one third of dominant women are. Extroverts, hardly surprisingly, have intercourse much more often and do so at an earlier age, with more people and in a greater variety of positions. The differences are quite large. For example, 45 per cent of extrovert men in one study had had intercourse at the age of nineteen compared with only 15 per cent of the introvert men. The difference in women was even more startling — introvert women had intercourse three times a month whereas the extroverts experienced it on an average of seven and a half times a month.
Psychologically ill people tend to be promiscuous, have more premarital sex and have more ‘hostility’ and ‘lack of satisfaction’, according to one study. Very sensitive people tend to experience more impotence (men) or frigidity (women) — that is, men failing to erect or ejaculate and women failing to have orgasms. People with so-called ‘hysterical’ personalities were found in one study to be sexually very experienced but highly guilt-ridden.
Social give-aways that reveal sexual activity are fairly useful when assessing the field. For example, smoking and drinking are good clues to a teenager’s sexual activity. Sexually inexperienced teenagers rarely get drunk and in one study sexually active teenagers smoked more than would be expected. Teenage girls who smoked more than twenty cigarettes a day were almost never virgins.
Girls who live away from home are more likely to be sexually experienced and girls living by themselves are least likely to be virgins. The lowest level of teenage sexual activity is found among girls living at home with both natural parents.
We have seen that attractive girls have more boyfriends but it does not stop there – they also have more intercourse. Attractive girls provably have a more active sex life and research shows that they have twice as many male friends and have been in love more often. Attractive girls say that more of their friends have had intercourse but perhaps all of their friends are attractive!
The subject of virginity comes high on the priority list of sexual attraction for many people and many men still want to marry a virgin. Very little is known about why boys remain virgins but some have religious scruples or other moral objections. It looks as though the vast majority simply have not had the opportunity.
In one survey of late-adolescent boys 58 per cent said they wanted to marry a virgin or, more exactly, to be the only sex partner the woman they marry has had.
The majority of girls (more than ninety per cent) are not virgins on their wedding day. About two thirds claim in surveys to have slept only with their husband-to-be but all such evidence must be taken with a large pinch of salt. Clinical experience suggests that this is much too low a figure and that many have had other sexual partners but dare not admit it — even to themselves on occasions.
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