‘Is promiscuity going out of fashion? Intimacy expert reveals how our love lives have changed

Promiscuity is “out of fashion,” according to a leading sex expert, who says our love lives have changed dramatically since the Covid pandemic, with couples having less sex but more variety, and singletons seeking relationships during one night stands.

dr. Justin Garcia, 37, is the director of the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University, a research organization dedicated to the study of human sexuality founded in 1947 by biologist Dr. Alfred Kinsey.

Speak with The timesdiscussed dr. Garcia recent research showing how daters’ intentions have changed in recent years, as has openness about his job.

The evolutionary biologist, the organization’s youngest-ever leader, took on the role in 2019. Since then, he says people find out what he does for a living, they often “tell me things.” Very intimate things’.

In addition to learning these anecdotal stories, Dr. Garcia is a team of academics who publish about 100 articles each year on topics of intimacy, sex and relationships.

One of the most interesting theories emerging from the Institute’s work is the idea that ‘promiscuity is out of fashion’, and while this is based on data from the US, Dr. Garcia said, ‘I think it’s happening globally. happens’.

Data from the institute’s 11th annual report, Singles in America, which surveys 5,000 Americans each year about their intimate lives, shows that two in three singletons now prefer to wait until after the third date to have sex.

In addition, about 81 percent of men surveyed said they consider sex less important now than before the pandemic.

According to the survey, only 11 percent of singletons say they want to casually date, while 62 percent say they are more interested in finding a meaningful, committed relationship.

The report says: ‘We’re not saying that one-night stands are gone forever, but they are definitely on the decline. And social distancing isn’t the only explanation.

dr. Justin Garcia (pictured) is an evolutionary biologist and the director of the Kinsey Institute, which publishes research on sex and relationships

Who was Alfred Kinsey? The pioneering sexpert who founded the Kinsey Institute

Alfred Kinsey is widely regarded as the father of “sexology” – founding the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University in 1947.

Now known as the Kinsey Institute, it features a team of anthropologists, biologists, sociologists and psychologists who research relationships and sex.

Alfred Kinsey was born in 1894 in Hoboken, New Jersey. From an early age he showed a great interest in nature and camping and would later join the Boy Scouts.

His parents, both devout Christians, fully supported him in this when the Scouting movement embraced their principles.

Kinsey’s interest in the natural world would lead him to arrive at Indiana University in 1920, a year after receiving his PhD in biology from Harvard University.

Alfred Kinsey (pictured) is widely regarded as the father of “sexology” – founding the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University in 1947

After 20 years in this field of entomology, he started teaching ‘Marriage and Family’ – a course for senior and married students.

It was during this time that his study of the subject of sex increased and he began collecting sex histories to bolster his research.

Within three years, Kinsey had collected about 2,000 sexual histories and earned a $1,600 grant from the National Research Council’s Committee for Research on the Problems of Sex. In 1947, the committee had funded the Kinsey team with a $40,000 grant.

His fascination with human sex life would lead to the publication of two reports – Sexual Behavior in the Human Man (1948) and Sexual Behavior in the Human Woman (1953). These were called the ‘Kinsey Reports’.

Based on 18,500 personal interviews, they cover a wide variety of sexual behavior.

Although his analysis was carefully conducted, the studies were heavily criticized for irregularities in sampling and the unreliability of face-to-face communication.

One of his findings was that 10 percent of American men were gay.

dr. Kinsey died unexpectedly at age 62 on August 25, 1956. Earlier that year, he gave an interview to NBC News, interviewing his last two subjects.

He personally took 7,985 of the approximately 18,000 sex histories collected by the research team.

In 2004, a movie was released, Kinsey, describing his life, starring Liam Neeson.

Above, Liam Neeson as Alfred Kinsey in the 2004 biopic, Kinsey

“The pandemic has fueled a hunger for more meaningful, lasting and long-lasting relationships.

And much to the shock of many, young singles are embracing this trend the most… So how could this affect society in the future? Time will tell. But it’s possible that this desire for more involvement could lead future generations to grow up with more family stability.”

He also noted that people date with more ‘intent’, in other words have a dating goal and be clear about it, e.g. want to be in a relationship in a certain time frame.

Meanwhile, those in committed relationships have also seen changes in their intimate lives, according to Dr. Garcia.

In a study published in 2020, he found that instead of people in relationships who had more sex during the pandemic, as predicted, the frequency fell by 43 percent.

As an evolutionary biologist, Dr. Garcia concluded that ‘our physiology reacted a bit to a threat, which is not conducive to mating’.

Although the frequency dropped, there were some positives to the findings, with nearly half (49 percent) saying they had tried a new sexual position.

In addition, 41 percent revealed that they had shared sexual fantasies with their partner, although only 27 percent acted on them.

Dr Garcia told the Times: ‘We all thought, ‘Wow, in some ways this is really an indictment of how we talk about sex’ that it took incarceration for people who, in some cases, had been together for decades, to turn against their partner. saying, “Is there anything you’ve ever wanted to try?”.

“The pandemic forced all of us to slow down and focus on the people we were most connected to, and nurture those connections.”

In other words, as people struggled to weather the storm of the pandemic and subsequent economic hardships, they sought meaningful connections rather than one-night stands.

For example, another area the Institute has written about is sex technology, erotic webcam sites, virtual reality pornography, or even just the ability to share sexually explicit images or videos.

Researchers found that people are more likely to use these emerging technologies if they suffer from anxiety or depression, and that using sex technology can help people with impaired mental health experience temporary relief from their mental health problems.

The survey of 8,004 U.S. adults found that while this trend was true for men of all sexual orientations, depression was not significantly associated with sex technology use among bisexual and lesbian women, while anxiety was not associated with sex technology use among heterosexual women. .

In addition, the researchers found that people who felt lonely were less likely, not more, to engage in sex technology.

When the research was released, social psychologist Amanda Gesselman of the Kinsey Institute said it’s a common misconception that people only go to the Internet for romantic or sexual connections if they’re incapable of personal relationships.

“Our results provide evidence to the contrary, suggesting that online sexual spaces do not act as ‘last resort’ for people who have not been able to engage in sexual relations in real life,” she explained.

“Instead, it is likely that many users in these spaces have social support and adequate social networking, but they are turning to online sexual technologies for a unique boost to their psychological mindset.”

While these findings undoubtedly provide opportunities and support for couples working with relationship issues, the field of sex research is often not taken seriously, said Dr. Garcia.

But it’s important, he stresses, because sexual problems are the main predictor of a couple getting divorced.

“So if we want to keep marriages together, let’s work on sex and couples,” he said.