It seems that this 2011 effort is the magazine's effort to put together their own numbers as a current day follow up to their last such effort. In 1983 the magazine surveyed 65,396 male and 14,928 female readers and together with these latest numbers, Playboy reports on the latest with a comparison to the state of our affairs circa the early 1980s. This year's survey is actually two surveys. The first consisted of 8,002 male and 2,001 female visitors to Playboy.Com and the second involves surveying non Playboy readers online, 1,210 men and 1,100 women.
The editors in their introduction to the survey make this observation which most certainly shines the spotlight on the differences between the world of 1983 and the world of today.
Certainly a number of factors have changed how we view and practice sex since 1983—AIDS and Viagra come to mind. But a great amount of the new data we collected points to the influence of internet porn. This includes a huge leap in the number of people who report watching adult movies (78 percent today, 40 percent in 1983). Both men and women masturbate more while having less intercourse. In 1983 we didn't ask if people shaved their pubic hair—who would do that? Now more than half the respondents in our survey are trimming. We also noticed a boost in the incidence of reverse cowgirl—woman on top, facing away—a position popularized by porn.
Need more evidence? The security cam and gonzo porn genres are phenoms supported by the huge increase in readers who say they have had sex in public or other risky places (up to 76 percent from about 35 percent). And what's one to make of the fact that 70 percent of female respondents have been photographed nude and nearly 50 percent while having sex? Thanks to digital cameras and smartphones, you no longer need to develop the film. That's progress.
(Playboy: introduction to the survey)
Selected highlights
Here are some of statistics from the survey. Remember that the current survey is compared with the previous survey done in 1983.
Sexual Frequency
The category "2 or 3 times a week" has dropped while the categories "once a week", "once a month", and "less than once a month" have gone up. This would seem to clearly indicate that couples are having less sex. Well, less sex together. - FYI: From previous reading, I would take once a week, maybe twice as being closer to the national average.
How frequently do you have sex?
- At least once a day: 5% (Male 4%, Female 8%)
- 4 or 5 times a week: 13% (Male 12%, Female 17%)
- 2 or 3 times a week: 28% (Male 28%, Female 30%)
1983: 33.5% (Male 30%, Female 37%) - Once a week: 22% (Male 23%, Female 21%)
1983: 13% (Male 13%, Female 31%) - Once a month: 14% (Male 14%, Female 11%)
1983: 4.5% (Male 4%, Female 13%) - Every other month: 4% (Male 4%, Female 3%)
- 2 or 3 times a year: 5% (Male 5%, Female 3%)
- Less than two times a year: 6% (Male 7%, Female 4%)
- Decline to answer: 3%
- Yes, the frequency is satisfactory: 32% (Male 30%, Female 41%)
- No, I'd like have sex more often: 67% (Male 69%, Female 56%)
- No, I'd like to have sex less often: 1%
- Decline to answer: 1%
The categories "at least once a day"and "a few times a week" have gone up while the other less frequent categories have remained pretty much the same. Once again, we have a clear indication and that is more solo sex.
- once a day: 19.5% (Male 23%, Female 15%)
1983: 14% (Male 19%, Female 9%) - few times a week: 40.5% (Male 44%, Female 37%)
1983: 25% (Male 31%, Female 19%) - once a week: 13% (Male 12%, Female 14%)
1983: 13% (Male 14%, Female 12%) - once or twice a month: 12% (Male 10%, Female 14%)
1983: 15.5% (Male 13%, Female 18%) - less than once a month: 11.5% (Male 8%, Female 15%)
1983: 13% (Male 10%, Female 16%)
Have you ever...?
Interestingly enough, "cheating on a spouse" has dropped. Are we being more faithful? Or are we finding other outlets for our primal urges?
But the other categories have gone up: "talked dirty during sex", "used a vibrator", "tried bondage", and "watched porn". We are experimenting more now than we were thirty years ago.
watched porn: 78.5% (Male 78%, Female 79%)
1983: 40% (Male 38%, Female 42%)
Virgins
40 percent of adults between 18 and 24 years old have not yet had sex while 5% of those between 35 and 44 are still virgins. This is backed up by a study from the National Center for Health Statistics which concluded that teen sex has dropped. (see Teenagers and sex: More chaste, less chased) Despite all this talk about sex, we may not necessarily be going to hell in a handbasket.
Pubic hair is out
Back in the 80s, nobody thought to ask the question. Today 30% of men and 32% of women are trimming or shaving their nether regions.
STDs
I noted that several sites commenting on the Play survey were a little upset at the results concerning Sexually Transmitted Diseases. People are not doing enough to protect themselves from STDs and seem to be taking a lackadaisical attitude to it: if it happens, it happens. Come on, folks! You can do better than that! Heck, you need to do better than that. Then on top of it, if you catch something you don't inform your partner!?!
The following questions were asked of respondents who've had sex:
What do you do about protection from sexually transmitted diseases (STDS) the first time you have sex with someone?
- I use some type of protection: 47 percent (Male 53 percent, Female 22 percent)
- I offer to use some type of protection: 14 percent (Male 16 percent, Female 4 percent)
- I insist on my partner's using some type of protection: 11 percent (Male 4, Female 41)
- I don't worry about protection: 10 percent (Male 10 percent, Female 11 percent)
- I ask if my partner is using some type of protection: 6 percent (Male 5, Female 9)
- I say nothing and hope for the best: 6 percent
- I don't believe in protection: 1 percent
- Decline to answer: 6 percent (Male 5 percent, Female 8 percent)
Have you ever been diagnosed with a sexually transmitted disease (STD)?
- Yes: 11 percent (Male 9 percent, Female 18 percent)
- No: 87 percent (Male 90 percent, Female 80 percent)
- Decline to answer: 1 percent (Male 1 percent, Female 2 percent)
- Every time: 64 percent (Male 63 percent, Female 68 percent)
- Most time: 8 percent (Male 9 percent, Female 7 percent)
- Sometimes: 5 percent
- Rarely: 3 percent (Male 4 percent, Female 2 percent)
- Never: 12 percent (Male 13 percent, Female 11 percent)
- Decline to answer: 7 percent
- Yes: 52 percent (Male 49 percent, Female 66 percent)
- No: 43 percent (Male 46 percent, Female 29 percent)
- Not sure: 4 percent
- Decline to answer: 1 percent
The above questions cover STDs but what about babies?
The following question was asked of straight people who've had sex with opposite gender:
What do you do about birth control the first time you have sexual intercourse with someone?
- I use some type of birth control: 39 percent (Male 38 percent, Female 44 percent)
- I ask if my partner is using some type of birth control: 17 percent (M19, F3)
- I don't worry about birth control: 12 percent (Male 11 percent, Female 15 percent)
- I offer to use some type of birth control: 12 percent (Male 13 percent, Female 3 percent)
- I insist on my partner's using some type of birth control: 10 percent (M7, F24)
- I say nothing and hope for the best: 5 percent (Male 6 percent, Female 3 percent)
- I don't believe in birth control: 1 percent
- Decline to answer: 5 percent (Male 4 percent, Female 7 percent)
There two sides the coin here: people saying whether they've had an orgasm or not then whether they think their partner has had an orgasm or not. And just so you know, 31% say they have faked an orgasm (men:24%, women:59%). Keep that in mind as you look over the percentages.
During sex, would you say that you have an orgasm…
- Always: 55 percent (Male 61 percent, Female 30 percent)
- Usually: 32 percent (Male 31 percent, Female 36 percent)
- Sometimes: 8 percent (Male 5 percent, Female 19 percent)
- Rarely: 3 percent (Male 1 percent, Female 10 percent)
- Never: 1 percent (Male: less than 1 percent, Female 5 percent)
- Decline to answer: 1 percent
- Always: 40 percent (Male 32 percent, Female 73 percent)
- Usually: 42 percent (Male 47 percent, Female 23 percent)
- Sometimes: 13 percent (Male 16 percent, Female 2 percent)
- Rarely: 3 percent (Male 3 percent, Female less than 1 percent)
- Never: 1 percent
- Decline to answer: 1 percent
A walk on the wild side? Bondage and discipline, sadism and masochism, covers a spectrum of dominance and submission role-playing. I'm reading the book Shameless by Pamela Madsen and she touches upon the rewards of this usually hidden part of one's psyche. Don't knock it until you've tried it. (Wikipedia:BDSM; Shameless by Pamela Madsen)
Spanking: 54% (Men:51%, Women:66%)
Bondage: 24% (Men:22%, Women:32%) - 1983: 14% (Men:11%, Women:17%)
Choking games: 12% (Men:10%, Women:20%)
Had “rough” sex: 62% (Men:58%, Women:76%)
Used a blindfold during sex: 32%t (Men:30%, Women:37%)
Pornography
As the editors pointed out, with the availability of pornography over the Internet, it would seem that more people have watched it or are viewing it and as such, it has had an influence on what we do. As previously stated, 78.5% of the respondents watch porn (Male 78%, Female 79%) as compared to 1983 when it was 40% (Male 38%, Female 42%). 63% of the respondents have watched pornography together (male 62%, female 70%).
In the past five years have you done any of the following?
- Visited a hardcore online website: 71% (Male: 74%, Female: 54%)
- Visited a strip club: 46% (Male:48%, Female:35%)
- Paid for a lap dance: 30% (Male:33%, Female:17%)
- Paid to view a sexual pay-per-view movie/event on television: 20% (Male:21%, Female:18%)
- Paid for access to hardcore online website: 12% (Male:14%, Female:7%)
- Subscribed to a premium adult television channel: 10% (Male:11%, Female:8%)
- Paid for a sensual massage: 7% (Male:8%, Female:5%)
- None of these: 16% (Male:14%, Female:27%)
- Decline to answer: 1%
- Yes: 59% (Male 63%, Female 41%)
- No: 39% (Male 35%, Female 58%)
- Decline to answer: 1%
The survey was published in the June 2011 issue of Playboy so I purchased a copy of the magazine so I could read all the details first-hand. It was a personal sacrifice for the sake of journalism.
I bought a copy which represented the first time I had bought any explicit material in 20 years. - Gosh, am I out of touch or what? - But after I bought it, I realised I should have brought my briefcase as I was then obliged to walk around carrying the magazine and even had to walk back to my office with it. I felt like an embarrassed teenager hoping nobody would catch me with it. Ha!
I know everybody's going to chuckle at me saying this, but I always remember Playboy as a quality publication merely with tasteful pictures of naked women. I said that if you took out the photographs, you would have a magazine on par with something like Harper's or Atlantic Monthly. In other words, I would have bought it even if it didn't have the pics. It was a good read.
Final Word
I discovered that the on-line version of the survey has a more comprehensive list of the survey than the magazine does. - I didn't have to buy the mag at all. - Below you will find links to the Playboy web site and can read over all the questions. I did not exhaustively cover everything and there are more interesting and titillating numbers to peruse about our collective sexual proclivities. I don't know if there is any conclusion to be made like the situation is worse now than it was in 1983 when Playboy conducted its first survey, but it seems that things are different.
I know that there is a vocal minority who are saying Internet pornography represents the Four Horses of the Apocalypse, however like everything with the Internet, this means everybody has more access to more information, information that was previously denied them. With the good comes the bad and I am sure this will sort itself out sooner or later. I strongly believe in sex education and it is because of ignorance that we end up in trouble. Well educated and fully informed people make better choices.
Sex remains pretty much a taboo subject. While we talk about it more today, we probably still don't talk about it enough; we have a lot of misinformation. Surveys like this shed a little light on what we collectively are doing and if nothing else, we might feel just a tad less ashamed of ourselves when discovering that we are not as perverted as we think. Thanks, Hef.
References
2011 Playboy Sex Survey: Introduction
Playboy Reader Survey
Responses from 8,002 male and 2,001 female visitors to Playboy.com
[At the bottom of the page, there are links to click to all 5 pages of the survey.]
Playboy/Harris Survey
Online interviews 1,210 men and 1,100 women
[At the bottom of the page, there are links to click to all 6 pages of the survey.]
official web site: Playboy.Com
Playboy Magazine
my blog: Sex in the Digital Age
For the past three years, the magazines Shape and Men's Fitness have teamed up to do an annual sex survey.
Would you rather give up your cell phone or sex for a year? 61% of the women and 78% of the men said they'd give up the cell. Okay, but I have to reflect on the other 39% of the women and the 22% of the men who could not give up their cell phone. I guess you only need one hand for a cell.
my blog: Teenagers and sex: More chaste, less chased
In 2002, in the age group 15 to 24, 21.9% of females and 21.9% of males reported no sexual contact with another person. In this latest study, females were 28.6% and males were 27.2%. In the group of teenagers, aged 15 to 19, 41.6% of the males have never had sexual contact with the opposite sex while for females, the number was 46.8%.
my blog: Pornography: an investigation
10 articles; 1 set of conclusions; 58 pages; 22,000 words; 4 weeks of research
2011-05-26
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1 comment:
Always an interesting (and timely) topic. I have to believe, however, that people misreport.
I'm guessing (betting?) they did in 1983, and even more so, now.
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