Justin Lehmiller, Ph.D.

My doctoral dissertation focused on secret relationships, and I quickly discovered that the mere mention of my research in social settings inevitably led to hushed conversations in the corner of a room, in which people disclosed various sexual exploitsespecially affairs.

In listening to these stories, something really struck me: A lot of people who seemed to be in perfectly happy relationships were committing infidelity. The first time I heard one of these accounts, it was from a woman who by all appearances had a model marriage and truly loved her husband. So it was a shock when she went on to tell me about the steamy affair she was having with the building maintenance man.

These stories fascinated me. We tend to think of people who step out on their spouse as being miserable in their marriage. But it turns out that a lot of happily married people with great sex lives end up cheating, too.

A recent study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology backs this up. Researchers at Florida State University and Northwestern University asked 233 newlywed couples (of which 232 were heterosexual) to complete multiple surveys over a three-and-a half-year period. The most surprising finding from this research was that being sexually satisfied in ones marriage actually increased the odds of committing infidelitya finding that was true for men and women alike.

Thats right: The people who were happiest with their sex lives actually cheated at higher rates, and there are all kinds of theories as to why.

One theory: The study authors suggest the possibility that people who have the most positive attitudes toward sex to begin with are more likely to cheat. So perhaps theyre cheating simply because theyre the most interested in sex overall.

That idea adds up for sex therapist David Ley, Ph.D., author of The Myth of Sex Addiction. People with high libido and high sexual sensation seeking [read: a strong need for sexual thrills] are also more highly sexually satisfied, perhaps because they value the sexual experience and place more emphasis on it in their life, he says. Interestingly, high sexual sensation seeking is also correlated with infidelity, Ley adds.

That theory also makes sense to me. A guy once told me he and his girlfriend had a very happy relationship with regular sex, but he found himself secretly visiting sex workers for more. According to him, the more he had sex with his partner, the more this revved up his libido and desire to have sex with other women. Paradoxically, he was actually the least inclined to cheat when he and his partner were going through a dry spell.

That newlywed study pointed to another surprising predictor of infidelity: physical attractiveness. Research assistants looked at photos of each study participant and rated their facial attractiveness, essentially determining who was hot and who was not. The authors then looked to see whether these attractiveness ratings were linked to cheating.

You might think that being more attractive would give someone more chances to cheat, but thats not what they found. Among women, those who were deemed more attractive were actually less likely to cheat, while those who were less attractive were more likely to cheat. Meanwhile, whether men cheated had nothing to do with how good-looking they were, but it did matter how attractive they thought their partner was. Men (but not women) were more likely to cheat if they thought their partner was less attractive.

In her 2017 book on cheating, The State of Affairs: Rethinking Infidelity, sex and relationship expert Esther Perel suggests yet another theory as to why happily married people have flings. She says these affairs are often about a crisis of identity that has nothing to do with the marriage itself and everything to do with the cheaters need for self-discovery. It might be about seeing what its like to break the rules for the first time in their lifeor exploring what their life might have been like if theyd taken a different path.

\"I have found sex therapy oftentimes has little to do with sex itself.\"

Cheating is usually a symptom of an underlying anxiety for men and women alike, says sex and relationship psychotherapist Arva Bensaheb, Ph.D. She remembers a client with the kind of marriage most men probably dream of: He had an intelligent, beautiful wife who wanted frequent sex and was down for trying lots of new things in the bedroom. Despite this, he couldnt stay monogamous and had a constant string of affairs.

But they werent about his wife or relationship, or even about unfulfilled sexual needs. They were about him coping with anxietyin particular, a powerful fear of death that had gripped him for several years. Sex with other people offered temporary relief by making him feel alive. I have found, Bensaheb says, that sex therapy oftentimes has little to do with sex itself.

Ultimately, what this means is that we all need to rethink our assumptions about cheating, and about marriage and relationships more broadly. We need to recognize that cheating doesnt always stem from relationship problems, and that a perfect marriage doesnt guarantee well be shielded from infidelity.

But there are steps you can take to lower your own chances of committing infidelity. If you find yourself happily married but tempted to stray (or perhaps youve already strayed a few times), it might be time to consult a therapist to explore why. If you invest some time in working on you now, you might save yourself and your spouse a lot of heartache and grief down the road.

Why Happy People Are More Likely to Cheat

When people learn I study sex and relationships for a living, they tell me things. But when they find out I study sexual secrets, thats when they really open up.

Why People With Great Sex Lives Are More Likely to Cheat

When I surveyed more than 4,000 Americans about their sexual fantasies for my book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Tell-Me-What-You-Want/dp/0738234958/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&amp;qid=1574781975&amp;sr=1-2" id="4d51977b-a492-3962-a359-797e76dd4a8a"> Tell Me What You Want </a> , rough sex turned out to be one of the two most common things people had fantasized about. Most peopleregardless of gender and sexual orientationappear to have been turned on by the idea at some point.

The widespread appeal of rough sex can also be seen in peoples porn viewing habits. For example, when you look at the most-viewed genres on Pornhub, rough sex and hardcore <a href="https://www.pornhub.com/insights/extreme-categories" id="151a44f9-9ab0-3275-a323-a877bfcc8593"> pretty consistently appear in the top third </a> of categories year in and year out. Interestingly, women are even more likely to view this kind of porn than are men.

So why is rough sex arousing to so many people, and especially to women?

A recent study published in the journal <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40806-019-00196-y" id="129412a8-df5d-33ff-a80c-16c60adbe679"> Evolutionary Psychological Science </a> offers some answers.

Researchers surveyed 734 college students in New York about their attitudes toward and experiences with consensual rough sex. Most of the students identified as female (77%) and as heterosexual (92%).

A majority of the sample (51%) said they had engaged in rough sex before, with the most frequently reported rough sex behaviors including scratching, spanking, pushing, name calling, tearing clothes, tying up, blindfolding, and slapping.

Before we go further, I should note that the authors of this study talk about these behaviors as playful force rather than as abuse or violence. Keep in mind that these are consensual behaviors that, more often than not, occurred in the context of a long-term relationship and rarely (less than 1% of the time) resulted in any kind of serious injury. In other words, we arent talking about behaviors where people truly wanted or tried to hurt a partner.

In fact, people seemed to really be enjoying this kind of sex. When asked to compare how rough sex differs from typical sex, both men and women said that orgasms are more frequent and intense, partners make more effort to satisfy one another, the sex is more arousing, and the thrusting is more vigorous.

Plus, women said that they orgasm much faster when they have rough sex. Given that theres already a fairly big disparity in how long it takes men and women to reach orgasm ( <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2019/6/26/how-long-does-it-take-women-and-men-to-orgasm" id="8ba84738-4f3d-3900-a031-aad92b30992f"> 5-6 minutes vs. 13 minutes, respectively </a> ), perhaps this is one reason rough sex is so widely desired and why women search for it more than men when viewing porn: Rough sex just might help to close the orgasm gap.

Romantic Couple Lying Down On Bed At Home

Beyond these enhancing effects on orgasm, what else might draw people to rough sex?

Participants in this study were given a long list of potential triggers of rough sex and asked to report whether theyd ever been prompted to have rough sex for each reason.

Among the most common triggers were trying something new, boredom, and playing out a fantasy. This tells us that rough sex is often just about feeding our need for sexual novelty. Humansmen and women alikehave a tendency to grow tired of sexual routines. We need to keep mixing things up in order to maintain sexual excitement, a phenomenon sex researchers refer to as <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2017/4/28/why-we-crave-sexual-novelty" id="c023c3a5-1570-3561-a85b-99e793524b43"> The Coolidge Effect </a> .

Another common trigger for rough sex, especially among men, was having been separated from ones partner, as well as suspecting that ones partner may have cheated. The authors of this study interpret these results through the same evolutionary lens: When men perceive a risk that their female partner has had sex with someone else, this triggers <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/147470490400200105" id="ff697513-46ad-3292-a893-6f34c3a1ac04"> sperm competition </a> . In other words, it leads men to engage in sexual behaviorslike deep and vigorous thrustingaimed at displacing any semen that may have been deposited by rival men so that their own sperm have a better shot at fertilization.

Drinking alcohol was another common trigger, which makes sense: Alcohol simultaneously lowers sexual inhibitions and dulls sexual sensations. This combination of factors ups the odds of trying something you might not otherwise do while sober, while also experimenting with more intense activities in order to counteract the depressing effect that alcohol has on our sexual system (which includes suppressing arousal and delaying orgasm).

Lastly, the other major set of triggers included situations where people were already in a heightened state of physiological arousal, such as after a fight, being angry at ones partner, and having just exercised. These triggers can be explained by something psychologists call <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Excitation-transfer_theory" id="7fddd260-83ba-3509-a74e-44331db85373"> excitation transfer </a> , which occurs when carryover arousal from one situation amplifies our arousal or excitement in an unrelated situation. In other words, if your body is already amped up at the start of a sexual encounter, thats going to lay the groundwork for pursuing a more active and intense experience.

What all of this tells us is that there isnt just one reason why rough sex is such a popular sexual fantasy and porn theme. Instead, it turns out that there are a lot of different factors that draw people to it.

The key thing to take away from this is that rough sex appears to be a normative sexual interest and we need to be very careful to distinguish it from sexual violence and relationship abuse. Rough sex is not exploitativeit is consensual and the people who have it are reporting an intense, mutually enjoyable experience.

Why So Many People Fantasize About Rough Sex

If you're into rough sex, you're definitely not alone.

There's Science That Explains Why Women Fantasize About Rough Sex

This is a question that a lot of men appear to have ponderedand a surprisingly large number of them have opted to hit send. According to the <a href="https://www.match.com/dnws/cpx/en-us/singlesinamerica/2017/" id="cb0fde67-7481-339e-aa22-0b289908ea73"> 2016 Singles in America Survey </a> , which included more than 5,500 Americans from across the country, nearly half of the men who participated (47%) admitted to having sent at least one dick pic.

While many of these photos were sent upon request or with the consent of a partner, many were not. In fact, this same survey found that among all women who had been on the receiving end of a dick pic, 49% did not request it.

Its one thing to send nude photos of yourself to someone who is expecting them, but its quite another to send them out of the blue. (In fact, it could also be a crime, depending on how unsafe it makes the receiver feel.)

So who are the guys sending these unsolicited photos anyway? And why are they sending them in the first place?

A new study published in the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00224499.2019.1639036" id="8cf1c20e-589a-3ab8-a3c8-7139642fc44c"> Journal of Sex Research </a> offers some intriguing insight.

In this study, a team of Canadian researchers surveyed 1,087 men, most of whom were recruited online. Participants ranged in age from 16-92, and all of them reported having sex exclusively with women. They were roughly evenly divided between those who have previously sent an unsolicited photo of their penis, and those who have not (48% vs. 52%, respectively).

Those who had sent such photos differed in terms of their demographic backgrounds, personalities, and attitudes toward women.

First, and perhaps not surprisingly, men who had sent unsolicited dick pics tended to be younger . They were less likely to be married and more likely to be in casual relationships.

Second, the photo senders tended to be more narcissistic . In other words, they tended to have an inflated sense of self-worth and an excessive need to be admired by others.

Third, guys who had sent these photos scored higher in both hostile and benevolent sexism . "Hostile sexism" refers to holding negative attitudes toward women, whereas "benevolent sexism" refers to the belief that women should be put on a pedestal.

So why did these guys say they sent unsolicited dick pics anyway? What were they hoping to get out of it?

The most commonly reported motivation was that they were hoping to receive a photo in return (44% reported this), followed by finding a sexual or romantic partner (33% reported this). In other words, most senders seemed to hope that the recipient would be turned on and willing to reciprocate, or perhaps to go on a date.

Fewer (18%) reported sending dick pics for personal gratification. This included getting a sexual thrill out of sending such photos, wanting to receive positive feedback about ones penis, as well as masochistic motivations, like wanting to be humiliated or receive insults about their penis.

About 1 in 10 guys said they sent these photos as a way of exerting power and control over someone, such as wanting to make the recipient angry after having a disagreement. Similarly, 6% reported misogynistic motivations, such as a general dislike for women.

Lastly, another 6% reported sending dick pics for reasons revolving around an unresolved childhood conflict, such as being shamed by ones parents about nudity at a young age and sending dick pics as a way of compensating for that. This suggests that there may be Freudian factors behind this behavior for at least a few guys.

Some caution is warranted when it comes to generalizing these findings, given the self-report nature of the data. For example, its possible that not all guys who send unsolicited dick pics admit to this behavior or report their true motivations for it. Also, because gay and bisexual men werent surveyed, we cant necessarily speak to their motivations for sending such photos.

That said, these findings tell us a few important things about unsolicited dick pics. First, it appears that when it comes to unsolicited dick pics, certain types of guys are more likely to send them than othersand the guys who send them do so for a wide range of reasons.

Second, these findings challenge a popular theory about why guys send unsolicited dick pics, which is that theyre primarily interested in shocking the recipient. <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/women-who-stray/201602/why-men-send-pics-their-junk" id="17ff15a8-d239-3420-aa5a-555face901f3"> Some psychologists have suggested </a> that dicks pics have become the new form of flashing or exhibitionism. Flashers are people who get off on non-consensually exposing their genitals to a stranger and seeing their shocked reaction. The fact that most guys in this study were sending dick pics as a form of flirtation tells us that this behavior is not primarily motivated by exhibitionistic tendencies.

If youre a guy who has sent or considered sending an unsolicited dick pic, what should you take away from all of this?

If youre doing it to exert dominance or control over someone, because you dislike women, or because its purely for your own gratification without regard for others feelings, please dont. Just stop. Take a break from your phone and get some help working through those issues.

If youre doing it because you see trading sexy photos as a form of flirting and you want to turn your partner on, then ask if its okay to send the photo first. The internet is replete with articles authored by women who find unsolicited dick pics to be <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/jan/08/what-makes-men-send-dick-pics" id="f6a976c3-b762-36d1-a8ad-9eec19b8d88f"> offensive, harassing, and a massive turn-off </a> . This suggests a very high probability of receiving a reaction opposite of the one most guys want.

Obtaining consent isnt just likely to result in a more favorable response, thoughits also just the right thing to do for any sexual behavior.

Why So Many Men Send Unsolicited Dick Pics

To send, or not to send a dick pic?

Why Do So Many Men Send Unsolicited Dick Pics?

They argue that women can help reduce female STI and cervical cancer rates by circumcising their sons, urging male family members and friends to opt for the procedure, choosing circumcised sex partners, and-if they have an uncircumcised partner-encouraging him to snip the tip.

Theyre basically saying that foreskin is such a major threat to womens health that women should support global efforts to eradicate it. To be clear, they think that men should support these efforts, too, because they believe circumcision offers STI protection regardless of gender.

But does circumcision really have such a dramatic impact on sexual health? And is it even a good idea to use public health as a justification for routinely cutting off part of the body?

Some research supports the idea that circumcision reduces mens risk for STIs, including <a href="http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(07)60312-2/abstract" id="4319a425-f62b-3cb4-a2cb-7574dc6e79ae"> HIV </a> ; however, there are serious limitations of these studies. Most importantly, much of the research has been conducted on heterosexual men in Africa, which means its not clear whether we can assume similar benefits for men of other sexualities or in different cultures.

It may be that circumcision offers limited HIV protection to straight men in Africa, where the rate of infection is very high (as many as 10 percent have it in some countries) and effective tools for preventing HIV (like condoms and PrEP) are scarce. In the United States, however, the situation is radically different. The rate of HIV is much lower to begin with (less than one-tenth of one percent of the population has it) and safe-sex tools are easier to come by. Plus, the most at-risk group in the US is gay and bisexual men, for whom we dont even know whether circumcision offers a protective benefit.

When you look at it this way, the potential health benefits of circumcision for men in America arent clear-cut. In terms of benefits for women, the authors of the new Frontiers paper claim that male circumcision reduces the risk of some bacterial infections of the vagina; however, those infections are treatable with antibiotics and, <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/std/bv/stats.htm" id="83b81e7c-600f-376f-a3cf-be7f44177914"> according to the CDC </a> , its not clear what role sexual activity plays in the development of these infections anyway, so it seems like a stretch to promote male circumcision as a means of preventing them.

That said, the authors also claim that male circumcision can reduce womens risk for HPV and, by extension, cervical cancer (most cases of which are caused by this virus). We now have a vaccine against HPV, however, that works in men and women alike. And with an effective vaccination program, like the one theyre working to implement in Australia, <a href="https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpub/article/PIIS2468-2667(18)30183-X/fulltext" id="84d05a42-294b-3bab-a922-bad32e48d020"> researchers claim that </a> HPV-related cervical cancer could be eliminated as a public health problem in the next two decades.

Given how effective this vaccine is, it raises the question of whether advocating for circumcision to prevent HPV is worth it. Besides, if circumcision were really so effective at reducing HPV, we would expect the rate of it to be lower in countries like the United States where most men are circumcised-but thats not what the research shows.

For example, consider the United States and the United Kingdom, where the rates of male circumcision are dramatically different and <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4772313/" id="529b22b4-808d-3f9c-ac86-1823db6ef1db"> estimated to be 71% and 21% </a> , respectively. The rate of high-risk genital HPV infection in the United States is 25.1% for men and 20.4% for women, <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db280.htm" id="2e09e31f-8c87-39c5-af39-efbb26bd9cbd"> according to the CDC </a> . By contrast, in Britain, the rate is 9.6% in men and 15.9% in women, according to <a href="https://sti.bmj.com/content/88/3/212" id="fdae52c3-ea75-3cba-a18a-5193983e12c7"> a nationally representative study </a> .

In other words, despite the US having way more circumcisions, we dont seem to have less HPV at the population level. However, since introduction of the HPV vaccine, rates of cervical cancer and HPV infection <a href="https://www.aappublications.org/news/2018/08/09/cervicalcancer080918" id="a099f7be-8c87-3d60-a31a-8d63645cc831"> have started dropping </a> in America, which tells us that vaccination-not circumcision-is the key to combating this problem.

There are questions to be raised about how much public health benefit there is to male circumcision, especially when weighed against the potential risks. Some studies report complication rates <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20158883" id="6686a1fe-3ec2-34d8-a66f-b3ece20902a3"> as high as two </a> percent and, in extremely rare cases, disfigurement and death have occurred.

But even if we conclude theres a net health benefit to male circumcision for men, women, or both, is that a good basis for arguing in favor of routine removal of foreskin? Maybe not.

Several cultures practice female circumcision, in which the clitoris and, in some cases, other parts of the vulva are removed. Westerners consider this practice cruel and abhorrent (especially because its often performed in unsanitary conditions without anesthesia), but what if data (like <a href="https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&amp;httpsredir=1&amp;article=1113&amp;context=iph_theses" id="85029287-b1cf-3368-a46e-888820b7acf1"> this study </a> ) showed that female circumcision was linked to lower rates of HIV? What if people started using these data to say that female circumcision was justified because there are sexual health benefits?

As you can see, the health benefits argument has the potential to backfire. You can find data showing health benefits of a lot of procedures, but this does not necessarily mean that they should be done. Benefits to public health must be weighed against ethics.

Some ethicists argue that no one should have the right to decide what happens to your genitals but you. After all, whats more personal to you than your penis (or vulva)? So should we be in the business of permanently altering kids genitals without taking into account what they want, especially when we know that some men regret having been circumcised and are now going to great lengths to have their <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2015/7/16/uncircumcised-a-look-at-the-history-and-evolution-of-foreskin-restoration" id="4a342c73-9bf6-31bf-afbf-dd004db0dbee"> foreskin restored </a> ?

I cant help but think about how people are increasingly recognizing that intersex children (those born with genitals that do not appear to be completely male or female) shouldnt be subjected to genital surgeries until they are old enough to consent.

In the past, doctors would assign intersex babies a gender and perform surgery to make their genitals consistent with that gender. However, psychologists have discovered that its not uncommon for intersexed people to later adopt a gender identity inconsistent with the one they were assigned and to be distressed about the irreversible decisions made by their parents and doctors.

In order to address this, California lawmakers recently proposed a <a href="https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-ca-intersex-kids-cosmetic-surgery-california-legislature-20190325-story.html" id="0d09f350-5401-3b5a-ab9b-1301c73f1e0b"> first-in-the-nation ban </a> on medically unnecessary surgery for intersex children in order to recognize their autonomy over their bodies. This bill raises an important question: If we agree that intersex children should have final say over surgical alteration of their genitals, should everyone else have the same right, too?

Justin Lehmiller, PhD is a Research Fellow at The Kinsey Institute and author of the blog <a href="http://lehmiller.com" id="7bd02d9b-defd-3fa5-a1a3-174881024307"> Sex and Psychology </a> . His latest book is <a href="https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/justin-j-lehmiller/tell-me-what-you-want/9780738234953/" id="ef11b886-a648-38c0-a6e8-dc85af7b3df0"> Tell Me What You Want: The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life </a> . Follow him on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/justinlehmiller" id="ac17d222-cfb0-3c19-a342-5946d8bb1966"> @JustinLehmiller </a> .

Can Circumcision Help Curb the Spread of STDs?

Male circumcision is a powerful tool to reduce the global burden of STIs on women, claims a new article published in the journal <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2019.00004/full" id="57d5dde9-dc79-34f9-a533-9fcfd758708d"> Frontiers in Public Health </a> . The authors, an international team of physicians, suggest that the benefits of the procedure to womens health are compelling enough that women should be actively involved in advocating for male circumcision.

The Reason Some Doctors Argue Men Should Get Circumcised

The fact that MILFs play such an outsized role in adult entertainment makes sense when you look at the content of mens sexual fantasies. I surveyed more than 4,000 American adults about their fantasies for my book <a href="https://amzn.to/2Y0aqmv" id="b6bb3bc3-ce76-3b85-ad27-91c6bdb0644a"> Tell Me What You Want </a> and found that 88 percent of heterosexual men said they had fantasized about MILFs before. In addition, 42 percent said they fantasize about MILFs often.

So what is it that makes moms alluring to so many men? In order to understand their appeal, we need to consider the way MILFs tend to be depicted in the world of porn. Research suggests that, more often than not, these women are portrayed quite differently than younger women are.

In a study published in the <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00224499.2013.829795#.U6CH6hZOhfM" id="06984775-3314-34fd-adc8-7ca465ea9c8f"> Journal of Sex Research </a> , researchers analyzed the content of 50 MILF videos and 50 teen videos taken from some of the most popular porn sites. The main thing they found was that MILFs were placed in more dominant roles, sexually and otherwise.

<a href=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot; data-vars-ga-outbound-link=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot;>Click here</a> to learn more about the Mens Health expert advisory board.

<a href=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot; data-vars-ga-outbound-link=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot;>Click here</a> to learn more about the Mens Health expert advisory bo...

While traditional gender roles suggest that men are supposed to be the initiators of sex while women are the gatekeepers, MILF porn presents a major reversal of those roles. Compared to teens, MILFs were two-and-a-half times more likely to initiate sex. MILFs were also much more likely to take control during the encounter. In fact, they were nine times more likely than teens to set the pace and direction of sex.

MILFs were also usually depicted as having higher occupational status over their male partners, something that was never once observed in any of the teen videos. Specifically, more than four out of five MILFs were shown having high status jobs, such as being the boss, judge, or teacher. By contrast, in MILF videos, men were usually depicted as students or lower-level employees.

These findings suggest that the men who are drawn to MILF porn may be turned on more generally by the idea of playing a submissive role to a powerful and dominant woman. My sexual fantasy data from Tell Me What You Want offer additional support for this idea.

Among straight men, I found that having frequent MILF fantasies was linked to having more fantasies about being sexually submissive, being sexually humiliated, and having sex forced upon you. Its worth noting that, among heterosexual women, those who reported more MILF fantasies were more likely to fantasize about being dominant, sexually humiliating a partner, and forcing sex on someone else.

In other words, men and women alike seem to associate MILFs with certain aspects of BDSM. When you consider that BDSM is <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2019/3/13/the-7-most-common-sex-fantasies-and-how-many-people-have-ever-had-them" id="430b04c2-1957-36fa-a4ca-06ebb965cbce"> one of the most common sexual fantasy themes </a> , this suggests that perhaps MILF scenarios are just one of many ways that people seek to enact those broader BDSM desires.

The appeal of MILFs, however, isnt all about interest in power and control. Interestingly, I also found that men who fantasized about MILFs tended to have more attachment anxiety, meaning they are more insecure in their relationships. Theyre worried that their partner might leave and they need quite a lot of reassurance.

To be clear, this was a small association, meaning that being into MILFs is far from a reliable sign that a given guy is insecure; however, the fact that theres a link at all suggests that there is at least a small percentage of men who take some psychological comfort in the idea of a MILF.

Anxious men <a href="https://www.menshealth.com/health/a26816894/stoke-desire-in-a-long-term-relationship/" id="3fd3d3fb-8dbb-3212-a1ad-c43d1f5d455f"> tend to be worried about sexual rejection </a> , so these men might prefer to be with a woman who makes her interest in sex clear and takes the lead. This means these guys dont need to put themselves in that position of vulnerability where they attempt to initiate sex but might have their advances rebuffed.

Consistent with this idea, mens MILF fantasies were linked more broadly to fantasies about being desired and wanted. Men who fantasized about MILFs were also more likely to fantasize about breast milk. This suggests that breast milk fetishes might be part of why some men are drawn to moms, too.

Lastly, I found that MILF fantasies were associated with fantasies about sexually pleasing a partner. When you consider that MILFs know what they want and are not afraid to say it, this tells us that another reason some guys may be drawn to MILFs is because its simply easier to please a woman who makes her sexual wants and desires clear.

When looking at the appeal of MILF porn and erotica, its clear that theres a very rich underlying psychology, but also that different men may be drawn to MILFs for very different reasons.

Justin Lehmiller, PhD is a Research Fellow at The Kinsey Institute and author of the blog <a href="http://lehmiller.com" id="7bd02d9b-defd-3fa5-a1a3-174881024307"> Sex and Psychology </a> . His latest book is <a href="https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/justin-j-lehmiller/tell-me-what-you-want/9780738234953/" id="ef11b886-a648-38c0-a6e8-dc85af7b3df0"> Tell Me What You Want: The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life </a> . Follow him on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/justinlehmiller" id="ac17d222-cfb0-3c19-a342-5946d8bb1966"> @JustinLehmiller </a>

What it Means if You're Really Into MILF Porn

In the world of porn and erotic fiction, moms seem so be all the rage. For example, MILF (an acronym for Mom Id Like to Fuck) was the third most popular search term on <a href="https://www.pornhub.com/insights/2018-year-in-review" id="3309d468-625d-370c-a86b-33331bd6dba8"> Pornhub </a> last year. It was also the third most-viewed category, and it boasts more than 40,000 videos. Likewise, if you search the erotica section on Amazons Kindle store, the term MILF brings up over 10,000 hits.

Daily Expert: What it Means if You're Really Into MILF Porn

<a href=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot; data-vars-ga-outbound-link=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot;>Click here</a> to learn more about the Mens Health expert advisory board.MENS HEALTH

Similarly, one of the most popular psychological theories of love, Robert Sternbergs <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/buy/1986-21992-001" id="5d999536-dfc0-37f8-abaf-fd972055cb86"> Triangular Theory </a> , describes sexual passion as the component of love that quickly peaks and then fades away. In the college courses I teach on human sexuality at <a href="https://kinseyinstitute.org/about/index.php" id="b38907b9-4b0d-3ad6-a1e5-0c5339a09682"> The Kinsey Institute </a> , the day I cover Sternbergs theory is usually one of the most depressing of the entire semester because it effectively confirms one of students worst fears about long-term love: the concept of eternal passion appears to be a myth. But many of you probably know couples that have lasted 20, 30, 40 even 50-plus years and seem happy.

So the loss of sexual desire is not inevitable. In fact, new research supports this notion and reveals that certain types of people may be more likely to experience a drop in desire than others.

In a set of studies published in the <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/ejsp.2567" id="a29f1150-6cc3-3c19-a024-f17e3b286a4f"> European Journal of Social Psychology </a> , researchers sought to understand the roles that both attachment style and gender play when it comes to maintaining sexual desire over time in a relationship.

Attachment style refers to the way that one thinks about and approaches relationships in general and its thought to stem, in part, from early interactions as children with our primary caregivers.

People who are securely attached tend to be the happiest in their relationships-theyre the most trusting of their partners and are the most confident in their partners love. Those who are anxiously attached tend to be worried that their partner will leave them and frequently look for signs of reassurance. People who are avoidantly attached are not comfortable with intimacy and try not to get too close.

Researchers conducted two similar studies, with the main difference being that the first one focused on 62 dating couples, while the second focused on 175 newlyweds in longer-term relationships. They followed-up with the dating couples three times over 8 months, while they checked in 4 times with the newlyweds over 18 months.

In addition to measuring feelings of attachment anxiety and avoidance, researchers measured feelings of sexual desire during each wave of data collection.

Men reported higher levels of sexual desire than did women at each time period. To be clear, this isnt to say that women necessarily reported low sexual desire, just that they reported less desire for sex relative to men on average (remember that theres always a lot of individual variability).

Also, consistent with what sex researchers and therapists often say about long-term relationships, on average, sexual desire declined over time for men and women in both dating and marital relationships. However, when they looked more closely at the data, that drop in desire didnt occur for everyone.

For men, the drop in desire was specific to those who were high in attachment anxiety-in other words, the guys who didnt feel confident in their relationships and needed a lot of reassurance found themselves wanting less sex over time. For men who were low in attachment anxiety, there was no significant change in level of sexual desire.

This suggests that when men are preoccupied with their relationships or are unsure of their partners feelings, this tends to take a toll on their sex lives, leading them to become less interested in sexual activity.

Interestingly, this effect of attachment anxiety was specific to men-womens desire declined over time no matter how anxious they felt. Its worth pointing out that women had a higher baseline level of attachment anxiety than did men, though. This might partially explain why the researchers found that that the highly anxious mens responses looked similar to the overall pattern for women; however, desire dropped at an even steeper rate for anxious men than it did for women.

It also turned out that men who were avoidantly attached (that is, men who were uncomfortable with intimacy) had a lower baseline level of desire for sex at the outset of the study. The same was true for women, but only women in dating relationships. The researchers believe that avoidant persons lower sexual desire is an intentional strategy aimed at limiting or minimizing closeness in their relationship.

These results tell us a few important things.

The first is that a drop in sexual desire is not necessarily inevitable in a long-term relationship because men who were securely attached dont necessarily seem to experience it. These results also suggest that sexual desire may be impacted by attachment style more for men than it is for women. Mind blown? Keep reading.

The researchers speculate based on previous studies that it might be because anxious men seem to be more sensitive to sexual rejection and are more worried about meeting their partners sexual needs. They suggest that these factors may make anxious men feel emotionally exhausted over time in sexual interactions with their partner. In other words, compared to men who are securely attached, anxious men come to see sex as an activity that is fraught with risk and is less rewarding overall.

Perhaps anxious men unconsciously protect themselves from feeling rejected in sexual interactions by progressively lowering their sexual expectations over time, the researchers speculate.

These results also tell us that the trajectory of sexual desire in a relationship isnt necessarily the same across genders. According to the researchers, womens sexual responses are more attuned to relational context, whereas mens are more individualistic and pleasure-centered. They go on to suggest that being anxious might make men think about sex in less individualistic terms-in other words, these men are thinking less about their own pleasure and more about their partners, as well as the quality of their overall relationship.

As a sex researcher myself, I cant help but think that there has to be a happy medium here thats optimal not only for maintaining sexual desire, but also maintaining a healthy relationship at the same time. If youre focused entirely on your own pleasure, that might be great for you, but not so much for your partner. At the same time, if youre focused entirely on your partner, that might make you a great lover, but your own sexual needs may go unfulfilled.

Perhaps all of us-regardless of gender and attachment style-would be better served if we worked toward being somewhere in the middle instead: be invested in your partners pleasure, but dont do it to the exclusion of having your own sexual needs met.

The portrait that sex researchers and therapists paint when they talk about the sex lives of long-term couples is often bleak. Many speak of a decline in sexual desire that begins after just a few years. For example, therapist <a href="https://www.estherperel.com/my-story" id="f138f152-43ed-347f-a895-771d16d44a02"> Esther Perel </a> writes in her now-famous book Mating in Captivity that the story of sex in committed modern couples often tells of a dwindling desire and includes a long list of...

Yes, You Can Have Hot Sex in A Long-Term Relationship

<a href=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot; target=&quot;_blank&quot; data-vars-ga-outbound-link=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot;>Click here</a> to learn more about the Mens Health expert advisory board.

<a href=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot; target=&quot;_blank&quot; data-vars-ga-outbound-link=&quot;https://www.menshealth.com/about/g26028263/mh-advisory-board/&quot;>Click here</a> to learn more about the Mens...

This rule is basically the Goldilocks approach to dating: Its about figuring out the time to have sex thats just right. Is there any scientific backing for this idea, though? And is the third date really when most people start having sex anyway?

Believe it or not, social scientists havent yet established which specific date is the most common one for people to start having sex, in part, because date is a pretty nebulous term. What counts as going on a date anyway? For example, does it have to be one-on-one, or can going out with a group of friends count, too? Also, how is dating different from talking or hanging out with someone?

Even if people could agree on a definition, the number of dates isnt all that meaningful to look at because people space them out very differently. Some people go on several dates in the same week, whereas others space them out over a month or more. In other words, two couples could be on their third date, but one pair might have known each other a lot longer than the other.

In order to get around these issues, researchers who study this topic have focused more on the length of time people have known each other rather than on how many dates theyve had.

A study published in the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23121225" id="fd3576ab-c258-35ee-ae6a-02f851400922"> Journal of Sex Research </a> of nearly 11,000 unmarried adults who were in serious or steady relationships inquired about when participants started having sex and looked at how this was related to their relationship satisfaction. Most participants (76 percent) had been in their relationships for more than one year, and nearly all of them (93 percent) reported having had sex with their partners.

Of those who were sexually active, a slight majority (51 percent) said they waited a few weeks before having sex, while just over one-third (38 percent) had sex either on the first date or within the first couple of weeks. The remaining 11 percent had sex before they even went on their first date.

Did the timing of sex matter in terms of how people felt about their relationships? Not in a meaningful way. There were only small differences between the groups, with those who had sex earlier tending to be slightly less satisfied. However, all of the groups were highly satisfied on average.

The fact that those who had sex earlier were a little less happy is to be expected based on research showing that sexual passion and excitement <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2017/9/25/how-sexual-satisfaction-changes-in-long-term-relationships" id="ff4c2070-9d52-38d3-aa18-0ef90d371b77"> tend to decline </a> over the course of a relationship. So if you start having sex sooner, the passion will wear off a little faster, unless you put in the work to keep it going (which you can do by <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2018/3/9/what-the-most-sexually-satisfied-couples-are-doing-in-bed" id="f12e811b-0582-35a6-abc5-d20329ca1e28"> regularly mixing it up </a> in the bedroom).

Theres something far more important than when you start having sex, and thats what your personality says about how sex and love go together. Everyone has whats called a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociosexual_orientation" id="b2ce1838-02aa-3c77-aac0-bdd7dcb908f5"> sociosexual orientation </a> , which is basically the degree to which you think sex and emotions are intertwined versus totally separate.

People who think that they go together tend to agree with statements like, I do not want to have sex with a person until I am sure that we will have a long-term, serious relationship. These folks have what psychologists call a restricted orientation.

By contrast, people who think that these things are separable tend to agree with statements like sex without love is OK. These people have what psychologists refer to as an unrestricted orientation. Unrestricted people are more comfortable with casual sex, and they tend to report <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15466599" id="6314c946-19dc-3686-a033-1751fbaadbe0"> higher sex drives and greater numbers of sex partners </a> over the course of their lives. As a result, the amount of time it takes for them to be comfortable having sex with a new partner is much shorter than it is for someone with a restricted orientation.

Neither orientation is inherently better or worse than the other, but knowing where you fall on this trait will give you insight into whether having sex sooner or later is the right approach for you. Understanding differences in sociosexual orientation can also help us to understand why so many couples disagree on the right time to start having sex as well as how much sex they should be having-if you put a restricted and an unrestricted person together, it might be challenging for them to get on the same page.

What all of this tells us is that there are no hard and fast rules for dating. Different things work well for different people depending on their personalities, so figure out where your comfort zone is-and your partners, too-rather than subscribing to some arbitrary rule.

How Long Should a Couple Wait Before Having Sex?

The iconic television series Sex and the City popularized the idea of the three date rule-the idea that, when it comes to sex, theres supposed to be a short waiting period. The goal is to give you a chance to evaluate the other person before hopping into bed. Plus, you dont want to give the other person the impression that youre over-eager, but you also dont want to wait too long to start having sex in case it turns out youre incompatible.

How Many Dates Should You Wait to Have Sex?

When faced with such problems, many men turn to their doctors seeking a medical fix; however, this isnt necessarily always the most helpful or cost-effective approach because many sexual difficulties have psychological roots. When things like distraction or performance anxiety are the true cause, taking a pill is unlikely to help.

It's for this reason that researchers are increasingly turning their attention to non-medical treatments that can help men prevent and resolve sexual problems. One technique that shows a lot of promise is mindfulness.

Mindfulness has been defined as <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2018/4/23/better-sex-through-mindfulness-an-interview-with-dr-lori-brotto-video" id="fe070e0e-2ec7-3a7d-a630-2ce082dbc776"> non-judgmental, present-moment awareness </a> , which basically just means being in the moment-being aware of your thoughts, feelings, and body sensations, without judging whether theyre right or wrong. In other words, its a way of focusing and redirecting attention to your body.

Youre essentially tuning in to your senses and tuning out mental distractions. You arent thinking about anything other than what youre physically feeling and experiencing in that moment.

Mindfulness has its basis in Buddhist traditions and meditation techniques, and psychologists have long recognized its potential to help people cope with a range of psychological issues, including sex problems.

[mediaosvideo align='center' embedId='582e51a1-403b-458d-8898-6b48aced4ffb' mediaId='47468727-46ee-44e3-9c70-47fa292f9328' size='large'][/mediaosvideo]

In the 1960s and 70s, William Masters and Virginia Johnson-the original masters of sex-were really the pioneers of applying mindfulness-based practices to the solution of mens and womens sexual difficulties. Although they never used the term mindfulness, the cornerstone of their approach to sex therapy was to get patients to focus on being in the here and now and to pay attention to body sensations evoked from a partners touch instead of getting lost in their heads.

Modern mindfulness practices go well beyond those developed by Masters and Johnson in the sense that they can be practiced individually or with a partner, and they involve paying attention to more than just the sense of touch-breathing, sound, taste, and other sensory input is part of what people are instructed to pay attention to as well.

So far, most research on mindfulness and sexual difficulties has focused on women, and the results have been impressive. Studies <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005796714000497" id="8daaed2e-4c40-373d-a925-a556b6b8f886"> have found </a> that mindfulness training significantly increases sexual desire and arousal, vaginal lubrication, and sexual satisfaction.

Research has only just begun exploring the effects of mindfulness on male sexual difficulties, but the results suggest that it is similarly effective.

A study published last year in the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30297094" id="2b5ed641-fd71-3661-aecb-90f511883e0e"> Journal of Sexual Medicine </a> found that mindfulness may be a useful approach for treating situational erectile dysfunction. This is when a man is still physically capable of getting erections when hes masturbating, but cannot sustain them in certain contexts, such as when hes with a specific partner with whom he feels high performance demands.

This was a small study, to be sure-just 10 men-all of whom participated in a month-long mindfulness training group. However, the results pointed to improvement in erectile functioning and sexual satisfaction over time.

Dr. Lori Brotto, a psychologist at the University of British Columbia and co-author of that study, says that the potential for mindfulness to help men have better sex goes far beyond this. In fact, in a 2013 paper published in the <a href="https://www.utpjournals.press/doi/abs/10.3138/cjhs.2013.2132" id="f3787f32-efd6-3f74-a620-9ad8f13c90f7"> Canadian Journal of Human Sexuality </a> , Brotto writes that her own clinical impressions suggest that mindfulness can also be extended to the treatment of men with premature ejaculation, delayed ejaculation, [and] low sexual desire.

Brotto also has a multi-year study underway exploring the impact of mindfulness on the sexual functioning of male prostate cancer survivors, a group she believes could benefit from this treatment approach tremendously.

Prostate cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed in men, affecting <a href="https://gis.cdc.gov/Cancer/USCS/DataViz.html" id="32e65851-219c-3b69-af4e-8672c77db100"> nearly 200,000 </a> new men each year in the United States alone. Although survival rates are high, treatments for prostate cancer often result in sexual side effects.

Brotto suggests that mindfulness has the potential to help these men considerably, because the sexual difficulties they face are compounded by sexual anxiety, changes in body image following treatment, and distress from having been diagnosed with cancer. In other words, male cancer survivors are a group that may be especially in need of tools that can help them get out of their heads and into the moment when theyre in the bedroom.

If youre interested in using mindfulness techniques to improve your own sex life, where do you begin? "Start by doing 10 minutes per day of formal mindful practice in your chair. Choose one time and do it every day," Brotto says. "During those 10 minutes guide your attention to different locations in your body and ask yourself what do I feel? Always focus on the sensations themselves, not the story behind the sensations.

Brotto adds that, after a few weeks of practice, and gaining more proficiency of using that mindful muscle, you can begin incorporating that skill into sex itself and ask yourself the same question: "What do I feel? Where do I feel it? Can I pay close enough attention to detect subtle changes in those sensations?" she says. "And when the mind distracts, gently guide it back. Over and over.

Being Mindful Is the Key to a Healthy Sex Life

Most men will experience a sexual difficulty at one time or another. In fact, researchers have found that as many as <a href="https://www.lehmiller.com/blog/2014/6/12/mens-most-common-sexual-problems-infographic" id="786f62e8-bb06-356d-af6e-84a49d53232a"> 42 percent of men </a> report having experienced at least one sexual problem in the last year alone. Premature ejaculation, low sexual desire, and erectile difficulties are among the most common issues men encounter.

Daily Expert: This Mindfulness Technique Will Enhance Your Sex Life

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