How Intercourse Frequency Is Affected by Relationship Length, Relationship Quality, and Sexual Strategies Using Couple Data

Abstract

The frequency of sexual intercourse within couples is associated with a variety of factors, such as relationship length, sexual and relationship satisfaction, and perceived quality of the relationship. Love, as a commitment device, might reduce interest in extrapair sex. Therefore, one can expect a negative association between measures of passion and sociosexual desire. Further, we wish to explore the effects of decoupling love and sex as measured by sociosexual attitudes on sexual frequency; as there might be a greater willingness to compromise on frequency of sex if sex is less related to expression of emotions and relational quality. We examined how men and women’s sociosexuality, relationship length and various dimensions of relationship quality impact couples’ intercourse frequency. Structural Equation Modeling analyses were performed on data from 92 romantically involved, heterosexual couples recruited at a Norwegian university. Participants’ age ranged from 19 to 30 years. The current relationship length ranged from 1 month to 9 years (M = 21 months). Intercourse frequency decreased with increased length of relationship. Both men and women’s ratings of relationship passion were strongly associated with frequency of having sex, but negatively associated with desire for extrapair sex. Intercourse was more frequent in couples where women reported less restricted attitudes, while men’s level of sociosexuality had no effect on intercourse frequency in any of the models. These novel findings suggest that while men in general might desire sex more, in this sample from a highly egalitarian nation, men might be compromising more than women do.
Advance online publication. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ebs0000173

Full text

How Intercourse Frequency Is Affected by Relationship Length,
Relationship Quality, and Sexual Strategies Using Couple Data
Trond Viggo Grøntvedt, Leif Edward Ottesen Kennair, and Mons Bendixen
Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway
The frequency of sexual intercourse within couples is associated with a variety of
factors, such as relationship length, sexual and relationship satisfaction, and perceived
quality of the relationship. Love, as a commitment device, might reduce interest in
extrapair sex. Therefore, one can expect a negative association between measures of
passion and sociosexual desire. Further, we wish to explore the effects of decoupling
love and sex as measured by sociosexual attitudes on sexual frequency; as there might
be a greater willingness to compromise on frequency of sex if sex is less related to
expression of emotions and relational quality. We examined how men and women’s
sociosexuality, relationship length and various dimensions of relationship quality
impact couples’ intercourse frequency. Structural Equation Modeling analyses were
performed on data from 92 romantically involved, heterosexual couples recruited at a
Norwegian university. Participants’ age ranged from 19 to 30 years. The current
relationship length ranged from 1 month to 9 years (M⫽21 months). Intercourse
frequency decreased with increased length of relationship. Both men and women’s
ratings of relationship passion were strongly associated with frequency of having sex,
but negatively associated with desire for extrapair sex. Intercourse was more frequent
in couples where women reported less restricted attitudes, while men’s level of
sociosexuality had no effect on intercourse frequency in any of the models. These novel
findings suggest that while men in general might desire sex more, in this sample from
a highly egalitarian nation, men might be compromising more than women do.
Public Significance Statement
What decides the frequency of sex within romantic relationships? We examined
how relationship length, relationship quality and short-term sexual orientation
influenced frequency of sexual intercourse in 92 couples. How often couples have
intercourse was predicted by the woman’s short-term sexual orientation, and par-
ticularly her attitudes toward casual sex. We suggest that in a highly egalitarian
country, men more than women compromise how often they have sex with their
partner.
Keywords: couples, intercourse, relationship, sexual strategies
This article was published Online First April 29, 2019.
Trond Viggo Grøntvedt, Department of Psychology
and Department of Public Health and General Practice,
Faculty of Medicine, Norwegian University of Science
and Technology, Trondheim, Norway; Leif Edward Ot-
tesen Kennair and Mons Bendixen, Department of Psy-
chology, Norwegian University of Science and Technol-
ogy.
The authors thanks Kyrre Svarva at the IT-section at
Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)
for formatting machine-readable questionnaires and for his
assistance in scanning the data. We also acknowledge the
assistance of students at the Bachelor Program in Psychol-
ogy at NTNU for their recruitment of participants and
scanning of data.
Correspondence concerning this article should be ad-
dressed to Mons Bendixen, Department of Psychology,
Norwegian University of Science and Technology,
Dragvoll Campus, NO-7491 Trondheim, Norway. E-mail:
mons.bendixen@ntnu.no
This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.
This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.
Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences
© 2019 American Psychological Association 2020, Vol. 14, No. 2, 147–159
2330-2925/20/$12.00 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ebs0000173
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