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Positioning the Booty-Call Relationship on the Spectrum of Relationships:
Sexual but More Emotional Than One-Night Stands
Peter K. Jonason
Department of Psychology, University of West Florida
Norman P. Li
School of Social Sciences, Singapore Management University
Jessica Richardson
Department of Psychology, New Mexico State University
Most research on human sexuality has focused on long-term pairbonds and one-night stands.
However, growing evidence suggests there are relationships that do not fit cleanly into either
of those categories. One of these relationships is a ‘‘booty-call relationship.’’ The purpose of
this study was to describe the sexual and emotional nature of booty-call relationships by (a)
examining the types of emotional and sexual acts involved in booty-call relationships and (b)
comparing the frequency of those acts in booty-call relationships to one-night stands and
serious long-term relationships. In addition, the manner in which sociosexuality is associated
with the commission of these acts was also examined. Demonstrative of booty-call relation-
ships’ sexual nature was individuals’ tendency to leave after sex and infrequent handholding.
In contrast, the romantic nature of booty-call relationships was demonstrated through the
frequency of acts like kissing. The results suggest the booty-call relationship is a distinct type
of relationship situated between one-night stands and serious romantic relationships.
Much research on human sexuality and romantic
relationships has focused on two polar-opposite
relationship types: long-term, committed relationships
like marriage (Buss, 1989; Christopher & Sprecher,
2000; Li, Bailey, Kenrick, & Linsenmeier, 2002) and
short-term, casual-sex relationships like one-night
stands or hook-ups (Cubbins & Tanfer, 2000; Fisher &
Byrne, 1978; Li & Kenrick, 2006; Paul, McManus, &
Hayes, 2000). Although insightful, such research is
nevertheless limited. It is common for people in nearly
all societies to form long-term bonds and marry (e.g.,
Fisher, 1992), and anonymous casual sex is variably
present in most societies (e.g., Schmitt, 2005), despite
the cultural and religious taboos or prescripts from
engaging in that behavior. However, a growing body
of evidence suggests the range of potential relationships
is larger than these two alone. Recent research expands
the variety of relationships to include ones where
partners have some degree of sexual contact and some
degree of friendship, but the partners are not in a
committed relationship. Some research has focused on
‘‘friends with benefits’’ (e.g., Afifi & Faulkner, 2000),
whereas other research has focused on ‘‘booty-call
1
relationships’’ (e.g., Jonason, Li, & Cason, 2009). In this
study, we focus on booty-call relationships.
Whatever term is used to refer to non-romantic
sexual relationships, they share several features. These
relationships appear to be simultaneously motivated
by both short-term (e.g., physical attractiveness is
prioritized) and long-term relationship (e.g., repeated
interactions) factors (Jonason et al., 2009). Both
relationships are likely to be appealing to men and
women for different reasons. The low-investment sexual
component may appeal to men (Buss & Schmitt, 1993;
Townsend, 1995; Townsend, Kline, & Wasserman,
1995; Townsend & Levy, 1990), and a prolonged period
of interaction allows women to give mates a ‘‘trial run’’
(Greiling & Buss, 2000; Impett & Peplau, 2003; Jensen-
Campbell, Graziano, & West, 1995; Li & Kenrick,
2006). If a relationship is a trial run, the partner has
likely passed the minimum threshold and is being given
We thank Laura Madson and Pamela Izzo for reviewing an earlier
version of this manuscript.
Correspondence should be addressed to Peter K. Jonason,
University of West Florida, Psychology Department Bldg. 41, 11000
University Parkway, Pensacola, FL 32514. E-mail: pjonason@uwf.edu
1
A booty-call itself ‘‘is a communication initiated towards a
non-long-term relationship partner with the urgent intent either stated
or implied, of having sexual activity and=or intercourse’’ (Jonason, Li,
& Cason, 2009, p. 3).
JOURNAL OF SEX RESEARCH, 47, 1–10, 2010
Copyright #The Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality
ISSN: 0022-4499 print=1559-8519 online
DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2010.497984
Downloaded By: [Jonason, Peter Karl] At: 21:27 28 July 2010
the opportunity to prove their worth as a serious
partner. Alternatively, although not particularly well
borne-out in the data, these relationships may function
as a ‘‘placeholder relationship’’ until a better relationship
comes along or as a source of stable social or emotional
support that cannot be provided in one-night stands.
2
These relationships are popular on college campuses.
Estimates suggest between 50% and 65% of college
students have experience in friends with benefits-type
relationships (Afifi & Faulkner, 2000; Puentes, Knox,
& Sussman, 2008). Alternative estimates suggest 30%
of college students report involvement in a booty-call
relationship (Jonason et al., 2009). Indeed, they are
common enough to be addressed in work on sexual
health (Singer et al., 2006). Whatever, the percentage,
it is clear friendship relationships that involve sex are
reasonably common among college participants and,
therefore, worthy of further study.
These types of relationships have proven to not only
be popular in empirical research and on college cam-
puses, but also garner interest in the popular press
(e.g., Marklein, 2002). Indeed, Men’s Health Magazine
has featured research on booty-call relationships twice
in recent years (Kylstra, 2009; Stoddard, 2010). There
has been enough popular attention to booty-call rela-
tionships that they have been studied in media research
on how images of sexuality in the media affect adoles-
cents (Ashcraft, 2003). The media attention suggests
these relationship types are of interest to the public
and, therefore, that more research is warranted.
In this study, we hope to provide evidence on what
sexual and emotional acts characterize the booty-call
relationship and how these acts might be associated with
sociosexuality. The use of sociosexuality may be
informative on the point that an emerging relationship
may be indistinguishable from a pre-established booty-
call relationship. Individuals with a restricted sociosexu-
ality are likely to be engaging in less sexual acts overall
than those who are unrestricted in their sociosexuality.
Last, we attempt to situate the booty-call relationship
on the spectrum of relationships between one-night
stands and serious romantic relationships. To do so,
we collect data in a two-phase approach to assess these
factors in one-night stands, serious romantic relation-
ships, and booty-call relationships.
One way to define the nature of a relationship is to
document the acts associated with a given relationship
(e.g., Grello, Welsh, & Harper, 2006). If booty-calls are
a hybrid of long- and short-term relationships (Jonason
et al., 2009), the types of acts involved in booty-calls
should be both emotional and sexual in nature. For
instance, the most frequently committed acts should be
ones like kissing and hugging—ostensibly, acts that
denote emotional involvement (e.g., Grello et al.,
2006)—and sexual acts like engaging in penile-vaginal sex.
Although booty-call relationships are likely to share
features with both short- and long-term relationships,
booty-calls should also be distinct from either type of
relationship. Nevertheless, they tend to align more
strongly with relationships that are short-term rather
than long-term in nature in that they are relatively sexual
in nature, physical attractiveness is a highly valued trait,
and commitment is lacking. Furthermore, although
booty-call relationships are expected to have some
emotional elements to them, they are not expected to
have particularly high levels of acts such as kissing and
handholding. Such emotional acts tend to be employed
by partners seeking or demonstrating commitment
(e.g., Grello et al., 2006) and, thus, should be relatively
lower for booty-call relationships than for more commit-
ted romantic relationships.
If booty-call relationships are more sexual than
emotional, we expect individuals to attempt to maintain
the primarily sexual nature by minimizing unnecessary
time spent together. Such time may otherwise lead to
either the progression of the relationship to a more
serious one or either partner developing feelings, thereby
undermining the convenient arrangement that booty-
call relationship partners may have worked out. To keep
the booty-call relationship a relatively sexual relation-
ship, individuals will likely need to use strategies that
keep the relationship from progressing to a more serious
relationship. One way to do this may be to leave after
sex. Therefore, we predict that the frequency of leaving
after sex will be higher in booty-call relationships than
in long-term, romantic relationships characterized by
spending time together and intimacy.
Similarly, the nature of booty-call relationships and
one-night stands are different and, therefore, we expect
the frequencies of acts committed to differ. One-night
stands are about immediate sexual gratification and
occur once, hence the name (Fisher & Byrne, 1978).
Although sex is important in booty-call relationships
(Jonason et al., 2009), they tend to occur over multiple
occasions. Multiple occasions provide more opportu-
nities for a greater range of sexual acts to be committed
within booty-call relationships—that is, with greater
‘‘time on target,’’ one can expand the sexual repertoire
the two partners engage in as both a function of time
and a sense of comfort that surely develops. For
instance, kissing various regions of the body, manual-
genital sex, and anal sex might become part of the sexual
repertoire of the pair if given enough time. In contrast,
in one-night stands, the limited interaction and immedi-
ate sexual needs likely focus individuals to do only the
‘‘essential’’ sex acts. Therefore, we predict that general-
ized kissing acts and anal and manual sex will be
committed more frequently in booty-call relationships
than in one-night stands.
2
For an alternative perspective on booty-calls—one that does not
involve evolutionary psychology—see Caruthers (2006) for an examin-
ation of how sociocultural factors may impact the development of such
relationships.
JONASON, LI, AND RICHARDSON
2
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An additional way to understand the nature of
booty-call relationships is to examine how individual dif-
ferences, like sociosexuality (e.g., Simpson & Gangestad,
1991), relate to the commission of the acts and to com-
pare sociosexuality scores across different relationship
contexts. Individuals with an unrestricted sexuality are
more willing to engage in casual-sex behaviors, whereas
those who have a restricted sexuality are reticent about
engaging in casual-sex behaviors. Therefore, we predict
sociosexuality scores will be correlated with the com-
mission of sexual acts and not emotional acts. Similarly,
we expect individuals’ sociosexuality will be associated
with the tendency to leave booty-call relationship
partners and one-night stand partners but not to leave
their serious partners. Leaving booty-call relationship
partners after sex may be a means to minimize emotional
commitments, but leaving after sex in the context of
one-night stands is simply part of the definition of a
one-night stand.
Accounting for the large variety of sexual behavior
and attitudes has been a goal of sex research since its
inception (Kinsey, Pomeroy, & Martin, 1948; Kinsey,
Pomeroy, Martin, & Gebhard, 1953). For instance, the
Sociosexuality Orientation Index (SOI; Simpson &
Gangestad, 1991) was designed to assess the ‘‘substantial
variability that individuals displayed across a wide array
of ...attitudes and behavior’’ (p. 870). However, much of
the research on mating has obscured the variety and
variability in human sexuality by dichotomizing the var-
iety in the sexuality of individuals. Specifically, relation-
ships and mating strategies have been assumed to
involve either long- or short-term relationships or both
(Gangestad & Simpson, 2000), but not as distinct rela-
tionships that incorporate both short- and long-term
elements (Jonason et al., 2009). Therefore, to better explore
the variety of sexuality in people’s lives, we examine one
hybrid relationship type that is garnering interest in both
academic and popular circles: the booty-call relationship.
Method
Participants, Procedures, and Measures
Prior research suggests few individuals had engaged in
booty-calls within the last year (Jonason et al., 2009).
Therefore, to be assured we had sufficiently large num-
bers of individuals who had engaged in this behavior,
we collected data in two phases. Because booty-calls were
central, the first phase focused on identifying participants
who had at least one booty-call relationship in the last
year. In both phases, student participants were directed
to a Web page hosted by an online data-collection instru-
ment after they signed up for the study.
In Phase 1, the first Web page asked participants
whether they had been in a booty-call relationship in the
past year. If they said ‘‘yes,’’ they began the study; if they
said ‘‘no,’’ they were redirected to another, unrelated
study.
3
To aid in this filtering process, we provided
participants with the definition for a booty-call: ‘‘A
communication initiated towards a non-long-term
relationship partner with the urgent intent, either stated
or implied, of having sexual activity and=or intercourse’’
(Jonason et al., 2009, p. 3). The Phase 1 sample was
composed of 123 participants (45% male and 55% female)
who received course credit for participation. The mean
age of the participants was 21.84 years (SD ¼3.15).
Eighty-six percent were heterosexual (49 males and 57
females), 6% were homosexual, and 8% (four males and
three females) were bisexual (two males and eight
females). Participants reported an average of 7.16
(SD ¼14.24) booty-call relationships in the last year, with
men (M¼7.47, SD ¼13.45) reporting equal amounts as
women (M¼6.91, SD ¼14.95), t(121) ¼0.22, ns.
In Phase 2, we sought out participants who had
experience with either one-night stands (n¼69;
males ¼17, females ¼50, unreported gender ¼2), long-
term relationships (n¼97; males ¼20, females ¼69,
unreported gender ¼8), or both in the last year. Women
reported significantly more one-night stands, v
2
(1,
N¼69) ¼16.25, p<.01; and serious romantic relation-
ships, v
2
(1, N¼97) ¼26.99, p<.01, than men did.
4
Again, participants were presented with a question that
asked whether they have had either a serious romantic
relationship or a one-night stand. If they said ‘‘yes,’’
they proceeded to the study; if they said ‘‘no,’’ they were
redirected to another, unrelated study. We did this to
make comparisons between acts committed in the con-
text of these two relationship types and acts committed
in booty-call relationships. The mean age of the parti-
cipants was 21.58 years (SD ¼4.59). Eighty-two percent
were heterosexual (19 males and 63 females), 3% (zero
males and three females) were homosexual, and 6%
(two males and four females) were bisexual (the remain-
der were nonresponsive). Individuals who participated
in Phase 1 could not participate in Phase 2.
In both phases, participants logged into a Web site to
complete a survey that asked them the frequency with
which they committed a series of acts in relation to a
partner with whom they were engaged in a one-night
stand, serious romantic relationship, or a booty-call
relationship in the last year. In each phase, only those
answers from unique IP addresses were included. Parti-
cipants were asked, ‘‘How often did you do the follow-
ing towards a person in the context of a [relationship
type]?’’ The scale ranged from 1 (not at all)to5(very
much). Participants were presented with a series of 17
3
Unfortunately, we did not keep track of this and, therefore, can-
not provide another estimate of the frequency of these relationships.
4
In most research, women report fewer sexual and romantic rela-
tionships than men do (e.g., Jonason & Fisher, 2009). This discrepancy,
we suspect, is the result of the small sample size and not veridical
differences.
POSITIONING THE BOOTY-CALL RELATIONSHIP
3
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author-generated acts. These acts were randomly pre-
sented to participants (see Table 1 for a list of these acts).
We also used the seven-item SOI (Simpson &
Gangestad, 1991). On a scale ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree)to9(strongly agree), participants were asked
how much they agreed with statements like, ‘‘I can
imagine myself being comfortable and enjoying casual
sex with different partners.’’ Participants were also
asked the frequency with which they had sex with
someone only one time. The seven items were standar-
dized (zscored) and averaged before creating indexes
from Phase 1 (Cronbach’s a¼.75) and Phase 2
(a¼.64) data. In Phase 1, t(121) ¼3.59, p<.01 (Cohen’s
d¼0.65) and Phase 2, t(89) ¼3.47, p<.01 (d¼0.74),
men had a less restricted sociosexuality than women
did. Sociosexuality scores did not differ across the three
relationship types (ts¼0.11–1.10, ns).
To understand overall tendencies toward sexual and
emotional acts across the relationship durations, we
created two composite variables. We averaged all the
items that explicitly referred to sex (four items; e.g.,
manual-genital sex and penile-vaginal sex) and emotion-
al acts (10 items; e.g., handholding and kissing) for
long-term, romantic relationships (as¼.69 and .90,
respectively); short-term, casual-sex relationships (as¼
.76 and .90, respectively); and booty-call relationships
(a¼.66 and .86, respectively).
Results
We conducted two types of analyses. First, we
conducted item analyses to understand the actual acts
that characterize booty-call relationships. Second, we
conducted similar analyses using indexes of emotional
and sexual acts to understand overall trends and
associations. Data from both phases were combined in
the results because of the equivalency of the samples.
Item Analyses
In Table 1, we present overall means for the frequency
with which participants committed the acts across the
relationship types, in descending order. Kissing the
partner on the lips or the neck and penile-vaginal sex
were the three most-common acts, whereas penile-anal
sex, vaginal-vaginal sex, and kissing the partner on the
hand were the three least-common acts associated with
booty-call relationships. The fourth most common act
was hugging the partner, and sixth was talking to a
booty-call relationship partner after sex. These are
consistent with Jonason et al.’s (2009) approach to
booty-call relationships. Acts that are more character-
istic of some degree of emotional intimacy (e.g., kissing
on the lips) were most common in serious relationships
but were also committed frequently in the context of
booty-call relationships. This also suggests that part of
the nature of booty-call relationships contains some
degree of emotional intimacy, as per Jonason et al.
Results in Table 1 also suggest that the booty-call
relationship falls between one-night stands and serious
romantic relationships in terms of the frequency of acts.
For eight (47%) out of 17 of the acts, the booty-call
relationship was in between the one-night stand and
serious romantic partner in terms of mean frequencies.
To determine which acts are more characteristic of each
Table 1. Mean Frequencies of Committing Acts in Booty-Call Relationships (Phase 1), One-Night Stands, and Serious Relationships
(Phase 2)
One-Night Stand (n¼69) Booty-Call Relationship (n¼123) Serious Relationship (n¼97)
Variable M SD M SD M SD
Kissed my partner on the lips. 3.88 1.17 3.92 1.27
a
4.58 0.94
a
Penile-vaginal sex with my partner. 3.54 1.42 3.83 1.38 3.83 1.40
Kissed my partner on the neck. 3.03 1.36
h
3.40 1.33
h
3.70 1.21
Hugged my partner. 3.39 1.42 3.28 1.26
b
4.33 1.03
b
Kissed my partner on some other body part. 2.88 1.18
i
3.27 1.32
i
3.66 1.17
Talked with my partner after we had sex. 3.16 1.36 3.19 1.26
c
3.93 1.32
c
Fondled my partner’s breasts or chest. 2.60 1.34
j
3.16 1.44
j
3.16 1.27
Kissed my partner on the breasts or chest. 2.59 1.29
k
3.11 1.43
k
3.27 1.21
Manual-genital sex with my partner. 2.62 1.32
l
3.11 1.40
l
2.88 1.40
Oral-genital sex with my partner. 2.73 1.12 3.02 1.48 3.11 1.34
Fondled my partner’s butt. 2.52 1.37 2.80 1.38 2.88 1.40
Kissed my partner on the face (but not the lips). 2.70 1.25 2.75 1.38
d
3.36 1.21
d
Held hands with my partner. 2.99 1.52
m
2.45 1.36
e
,
m
3.97 1.23
e
Left immediately after I had sex with my partner. 2.03 1.33 2.32 1.29
f
1.41 0.64
f
Penile-anal sex with my partner. 1.28 0.72
n
1.77 1.42
n
1.52 0.88
Kissed my partner on the hand. 1.91 1.12 1.76 1.28
g
2.44 1.25
g
Vaginal-vaginal sex with my partner. 1.33 0.96 1.53 1.21 1.29 0.92
Note. Comparisons among superscripts are significant at p<.05. The scale ranges from 1 (not at all), 2 (a little), 3 (moderately), 4 (much), to 5 (very
much).
JONASON, LI, AND RICHARDSON
4
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relationship and how the booty-call relationship is
situated between the other two, we compared the means
presented in Table 1 from Phase 1 and Phase 2. To do
so, we compared the frequency of acts from serious
romantic partners to booty-call relationships, and found
eight differences: kissing on the lips (t¼4.13, p<.01;
d¼0.59), hugging one’s partner (t¼6.43, p<.01;
d¼0.91), kissing partner on some other body part than
the face (t¼2.22, p<.05; d¼0.31), talking with one’s
partner after sex (t¼4.12, p<.01; d¼0.57), kissing
partner on the face but not the lips (t¼3.33, p<.01;
d¼1.07), holding hands with partner (t¼8.33, p<.01;
d¼1.17), and kissing partner on the hand (t¼2.84,
p<.05; d¼0.54). All of these acts were more common
in serious relationships than in booty-call relationships,
except for one: leaving immediately after sex (t¼6.10,
p<.01; d¼0.89).
We repeated this analysis procedure for one-night
stands, and found seven differences: Kissing partner’s
neck (t¼1.97, p<.05; d¼0.28), kissing some other
body part (t¼2.21, p<.05; d¼0.31), fondling partner’s
breasts or chest (t¼2.87, p<.01; d¼0.40), kissing
partner’s breasts or chest (t¼2.71, p<.01; d¼0.38),
manual-genital sex (t¼2.57, p<.05; d¼0.36), and
penile-anal sex (t¼2.97, p<.01; d¼0.44) were more
frequently committed in booty-calls than one-night
stands. In the case of holding partner’s hand, this act
appeared to be committed more frequently in the con-
text of one-night stands than booty-call relationships
(t¼2.71, p<.01; d¼0.37).
In Table 2, we present the associations between socio-
sexuality and the frequency of acts across relationships.
Consistent with our contention that the booty-call
relationship is more closely aligned with casual-sex
relationships, results suggest that an unrestricted mating
style predicts more of the sexuality of one-night stands and
booty-call relationships than serious romantic relation-
ships. For example, individuals’ scores on the SOI were
positively correlated with their tendency to leave immedi-
ately after sex for booty-call relationships and one-night
stands, but not for serious romantic relationships.
In Table 3, we examined the extent to which men and
women differ in reported acts across relationship
contexts. Sex differences were localized to a few acts.
For instance, women were more likely than men were
to report talking to their partners after having sex,
whereas men were more likely than women were to
report manual-genital sex with their partners. However,
overall, the sexes did not differ much in the acts commit-
ted across relationship contexts, suggesting men and
women do not differ in the commission of these acts
across relationship types.
Overall Analyses
We compared rates of frequency of act type (i.e.,
sexual acts vs. emotional acts) across relationship
contexts and correlated them with sociosexuality. In
doing so, we repeated the prior analyses, which used
item-level analyses, but now we used the indexes. First,
we compared the frequency of emotional and sexual acts
within each relationship context. As reported in Table 4,
frequency of sexual versus emotional acts did not
differ in booty-call relationships. Emotional acts
were more common than sexual acts in serious romantic
relationships than in booty-call relationships and, coun-
ter to what was predicted, more common in one-night
stands than booty-calls relationships.
We also compared the frequency of each type of act
between one-night stands and booty-call relationships,
Table 2. Correlations Between Sociosexuality and the Frequency of Acts Committed Across Booty-Call
Relationships (Phase 1) and One-Night Stands and Serious Relationships (Phase 2)
Variable One-Night Stand Booty-Call Relationship Serious Relationship
1. Kissed my partner on some other body part. .20 .23 .09
2. Penile-anal sex with my partner. .25 .43 .18
3. Penile-vaginal sex with my partner. .37 .21.28
4. Hugged my partner. .10 .06 .04
5. Kissed my partner on the face (but not the lips). .02 .02 .01
6. Fondled my partner’s butt. .23 .30 .08
7. Manual-genital sex with my partner. .18 .25 .08
8. Talked with my partner after we had sex. .06 .14 .05
9. Vaginal-vaginal sex with my partner. .02 .19.01
10. Kissed my partner on the lips. .01 .05 .09
11. Left immediately after I had sex with my partner. .32 .27 .18
12. Kissed my partner on the breasts or chest. .32 .31 .20
13. Oral-genital sex with my partner. .28.30 .23
14. Fondled my partner’s breasts or chest. .31.21.27
15. Kissed my partner on the hand. .06 .21.05
16. Held hands with my partner. .14 .09 .04
17. Kissed my partner on the neck. .23 .01 .15
p<.05. p<.01.
POSITIONING THE BOOTY-CALL RELATIONSHIP
5
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and serious romantic relationships and booty-call
relationships. Emotional acts were more common in
the context of romantic relationships than booty-call
relationships (t¼5.46, p<.01; d¼0.75). Sexual acts
were more common in booty-call relationships than
serious romantic relationships (t¼2.22, p<.05;
d¼0.38).
5
When we compared the frequency of
emotional and sexual acts across relationship type for
men and women, we found no significant sex differences.
Last, we assessed the association between sociosexu-
ality and the frequency of acts across the relationship
types. In the context of one-night stands, sociosexuality
was correlated with the frequency of sexual acts,
r(59) ¼.38, p<.01. In the context of booty-call relation-
ships, sociosexuality was correlated with the frequency
of sexual acts, r(123) ¼.42, p<.01. For serious romantic
relationships, sociosexuality was correlated with the
frequency of sexual acts, r(61) ¼.25, p<.05. No other
correlations were significant.
Discussion
The goal of this study was to address the lack of
research on romantic relationships other than those
at opposite ends of the spectrum of human sexuality.
In so doing, we focused on one type of relationship:
the booty-call relationship. The booty-call relationship
has been identified as a relationship that does not fit
well within the apparent dichotomy between one-night
stands and serious romantic relationships. Although
the underlying motivations have been documented
(Jonason et al., 2009), little research has been done
to understand the nature of these relationships. This
study partially fills that gap by assessing frequency of
acts committed in the context of booty-call relation-
ships, comparing those frequencies across two other
relationship types, and assessing how associations with
sociosexuality are related across these relationship
contexts and how they vary within the contexts of
the relationships.
Booty-call relationships appear to be characterized
by a combination of emotional (e.g., kissing on the lips)
and sexual (e.g., penile-vaginal sex) acts. Emotional acts
are of particular importance to demonstrate that booty-
call relationships are distinct from one-night stands.
One-night stands occur a single time, where sexual
gratification is paramount and emotional feelings or acts
5
This difference is on the small side and, thus, we urge caution in its
over-interpretation.
Table 3. Sex Differences for the Acts Committed in Booty-Call Relationships (Phase 1) and One-Night Stands and Serious
Relationships (Phase 2)
One-Night Stand Booty-Call Relationship Serious Relationship
Variable td t d t d
Kissed my partner on the lips. 1.62 0.41 2.100.38 0.29 0.06
Penile-vaginal sex with my partner. 0.73 0.18 0.87 0.16 0.67 0.14
Kissed my partner on the neck. 0.12 0.03 0.67 0.12 0.59 0.13
Hugged my partner. 0.83 0.21 1.18 0.21 0.97 0.21
Kissed my partner on some other body part. 0.44 0.11 1.14 0.21 0.72 0.15
Talked with my partner after we had sex. 2.240.56 2.85 0.51 1.990.43
Fondled my partner’s breasts or chest. 3.96 0.99 5.13 0.94 4.58 0.98
Kissed my partner on the breasts or chest. 2.64 0.66 4.61 0.84 3.59 0.77
Manual-genital sex with my partner. 0.77 0.19 1.40 0.25 0.02 0.00
Oral-genital sex with my partner. 0.52 0.13 0.82 0.15 0.76 0.16
Fondled my partner’s butt. 3.43 0.86 5.05 0.92 1.86 0.40
Kissed my partner on the face (but not the lips). 0.90 0.23 1.07 0.20 0.40 0.09
Held hands with my partner. 1.82 0.46 0.74 0.13 0.68 0.15
Left immediately after I had sex with my partner. 0.89 0.23 0.48 0.09 0.12 0.03
Penile-anal sex with my partner. 0.60 0.15 2.280.41 0.98 0.21
Kissed my partner on the hand. 0.34 0.09 1.05 0.19 1.19 0.26
Vaginal-vaginal sex with my partner. 0.13 0.03 0.74 0.13 1.35 0.29
Note. Means and standard deviations were omitted to save space, and can be obtained by contacting Peter K. Jonason. Negative values mean women
scored higher than men.
p<.05. p<.01.
Table 4. Comparisons across Act Type by Relationship
Context
Emotional Sexual
Variable MSDMSD t d
One-night stand 2.93 1.03 2.57 0.97 3.300.36
Booty-call relationship 3.01 0.90
a
2.94 1.00
b
0.91 0.07
Serious relationship 3.68 0.88
a
2.84 0.90
b
9.710.94
Note. Comparisons among superscripts are significant at p<.05.
p<.05. p<.01.
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are rather absent (Fisher & Byrne, 1978). In contrast,
booty-call relationships have the longevity to explore
other aspects and interests of the individuals’ sexuality.
Consistent with that, we found that booty-call relation-
ships were characterized by higher levels of kissing, in
general, as well as manual and anal sex than in one-night
stands. It may be that the limited time that characterizes
one-night stands forces individuals to prioritize a small
number of sex acts, or it may be that they do not feel
comfortable making sexual requests for less common
acts because they might lead to a global rejection and,
therefore, to no sex at all. In the relatively less tempor-
ary and more acquainted context of booty-call relation-
ships, individuals may have the freedom to explore their
sexuality more because they have more time and less
fear of being entirely rejected. Such possibilities should
be examined in the future.
Similarly, emotional acts can also demonstrate how
the booty-call relationship is distinct from serious
relationships. The frequencies of committing acts like
talking and handholding were higher in serious relation-
ships than booty-call relationships. Such acts may
denote a degree of emotional intimacy that individuals
in booty-call relationships may want to avoid. Indeed,
one glaring difference between acts committed with
serious versus booty-call relationship partners was that
leaving after sex was more frequent with booty-call
relationship partners. By minimizing acts that are
emotionally intimate and leaving after sex, partners
may effectively prevent booty-call relationships from
turning into committed, long-term relationships. For
instance, remaining after sex may lead to the develop-
ment of feelings in one partner, which will undermine
the ‘‘convenient arrangement’’ they have—perhaps
implicitly—negotiated (Jonason et al., 2009). Indeed,
men and women reported equal amounts of leaving after
sex, suggesting both partners are invested in maintaining
the casual nature of the booty-call relationship. Simi-
larly, individuals were more likely to leave after sex in
the context of booty-call relationships than one-night
stands. This may be because there is an implicit under-
standing between one-night stand partners that the
nature of the relationship is casual and temporary,
whereas the repeated encounters for booty-call relation-
ship partners requires such a strategy to maintain the
quasi-sexual nature of booty-call relationships.
However, booty-call relationships are not simply
one-night stands that repeat with the same person. They
appear to be distinct. For instance, unlike one-night
stands, booty-call relationships are characterized by an
equal amount of sexual and emotional acts. Indeed,
results suggest that one-night stands and serious roman-
tic relationships are more alike than they are different
when characterized by rates of commission of emotional
or sexual acts. Such evidence is consistent with the
contention of Jonason et al. (2009) and our previous
discussion, which suggests that focusing on one-night
stands and serious romantic relationships obscures the
complex nature of human sexuality. However, the fact
that there is this similarity between one-night stands
and serious romantic relationships could be an artifact
of our small sample size in Phase 2 across the two types
of relationships. Future work should further investigate
this issue.
One notable discrepancy is that participants who
engaged in one-night stands reported more emotional
than sexual acts. We did not predict this. However, on
second thought, this does make sense. If one-night stands
are characterized by a time constraint, few sexual acts
can occur, and the emotional acts may be used in quick
succession as means of escalating the relationship to
sex. The commission of both types of acts were most
frequent in serious relationships, which is consistent with
our time-based contention. Indeed, the use of emotional
acts to accelerate relationships to copulation—what one
might call foreplay—may be necessary in both one-night
stands and serious romantic relationships. This trend
toward increased emotional acts in serious romantic
relationships and one-night stands is demonstrated in
the results reported in Table 4, where emotional acts
were committed more frequently than sexual acts in
both types of relationships.
The fact that booty-call relationships did not differ
on the commission of either type of act may confirm
prior contentions that sexuality is not one-dimensional
(Jonason et al., 2009). Prior bipolar conceptualization
may reflect an underlying facet of time: one-night stands
being short in duration and serious relationships being
lengthy in duration. More time together may allow for
the development of comfort, and increased comfort
may facilitate a larger range of acts to be committed
of both a sexual and emotional nature. In contrast,
where time is constrained, like in one-night stands, there
are fewer sexual acts committed. Future work might
benefit from treating time in a relationship in a continu-
ous fashion instead of the de facto trichotimization used
here. This may yield interesting results about how
relationships progress from one form to another and
how the parameters of the relationship are negotiated
over time.
We found few sex differences in the acts individuals
committed across three relationship contexts. Men and
women may have a ‘‘standard’’ set of sexual acts that
they commit across various contexts. The few sex differ-
ences appeared to focus on men emphasizing the breast
and butt regions and women talking more. At least two
paradigms could account for this.
It is possible that these acts are part of the sexual
scripts that men and women have (DeLamater, 1987;
Gagnon & Simon, 1973). The sexual script of men is
characterized by sexual acts, whereas women’s sexual
script is characterized by emotional acts. For instance,
women may have been socialized to be oriented toward
relationships and to use language and communication to
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connect to their partners (e.g., Caruthers, 2006; Conger,
Cui, Bryant, & Elder, 2000). This could be one
explanation for the results that showed women wanted
to talk after sex more than men did.
Alternatively, and consistent with prior work on
booty-call relationships (Jonason et al., 2009), an
evolutionary perspective may be instructive. It may be
that men are predisposed to focus more on sexual fulfill-
ment as a function of their lessened need to invest in
their offspring (e.g., Buss & Schmitt, 1993). Women,
in contrast, may be predisposed to focus on emotional
acts as a means of testing a mate’s willingness to invest
as per the potentially high cost she pays for engaging in
sex (e.g., Li & Kenrick, 2006).
Two anomalous sex differences emerged in the con-
text of booty-call relationships. Women appeared to
report kissing their partners on the lips more than men
did, and men appeared to have more penile-anal sex than
women did. Although these differences may be spurious,
there are other possible explanations. For example, men
may report more penile-anal sex than women do as a
by-product of their tendency to over-report their sexual
experiences (e.g., Jonason, 2007; Jonason & Fisher,
2009) or because women underreport sexual experiences
for social desirability or to manage self-image (e.g.,
Meston, Heiman, Trapnell, & Paulhus, 1998).
Alternatively, these self-report asymmetries may be
the result of sex differences in preferred acts. For
example, women may especially value kissing their
booty-call relationship partners because they are trying
to assess their partner’s long-term potential. In contrast,
men, trying to maintain a sexual relationship, may mini-
mize kissing, as is common in both sexes for one-night
stands. As such, kissing may be more salient to women
in booty-call relationships. This conjecture is informed
by the idea that kissing may signify that two individuals
are a couple. A man’s willingness to kiss a woman in
public is likely to activate his desire to ensure his acts
are consistent with his self-concept (see Kiesler, Pallak,
& Kanouse, 1968); one solution being to see himself in
a serious relationship.
Although we have made progress toward document-
ing the nature of the booty-call relationship and differ-
entiating it from serious relationships and one-night
stands, there are various limitations. First, as mentioned
earlier, we collected data in two, between-subject phases
because few individuals had all three relationships
within a reasonable amount of time that they could
accurately report the frequency of committing the sexual
acts we asked. An alternative procedure could have been
to ask participants to report on their last serious
relationship, booty-call relationship, and one-night
stand. Although this procedure may have proven useful
to gain within-subjects data, we should be cautious of
data that asks individuals to report from many years
in the past because of the susceptibility of memory.
Nevertheless, because of our self-selective sampling
method, our cross-relationship comparisons may be
limited to being between people who have booty-call
relationships and those who are less likely to have such
relationships, rather than generalizing to how any given
individual might view each type of relationship. Ideally,
a within-subjects study would be used, where the same
participants are asked to detail the nature of their three
types of relationships. A within-subjects study would
also control for individual differences that may predict
reasons to engage in each relationship type, like socio-
sexuality. Having said that, we reported no differences
across relationship type in sociosexuality, so this con-
cern may be muted. However, what future work should
do is ask participants the name of their partner and then
make it so the questions are answered in reference to
that person, not in general.
Second, our study was descriptive in nature and,
therefore, we used ttests. This may have inflated our
Type 1 error. However, we would argue that the descrip-
tive nature of the study permits an inflation of Type 1
error to ensure reasonable power. Similarly, the descrip-
tive nature and limited theoretical framework to account
for variation in behavior in the context of booty-call
relationships, gives our predictions the air of post hoc.
We hope that, soon, researchers will have amassed
enough descriptive data on the full range of human
sexuality to create an all-encompassing paradigm.
Third, our study was limited to one less-researched
sexual act and utilized an author-generated list of acts.
There is likely a much wider range of acts that can be
used to define relationships, and future work should
replicate our results with a larger range of acts. The fact
that we utilized author-generated scales may relate to
the less than ideal rates of internal consistency for the
sexual acts index. In all three cases, the alphas for the
sexual acts scale were on the moderate-to-low side.
These alphas are likely related to the fact that scales
composed of a small number of items take a penalty
in terms of internal consistency because of the positive
relationship between number of items in a scale and
alpha (Carmines & Zeller, 1979). Indeed, the larger
emotional acts scale reinforces our point. Moreover,
alphas over .50 are reasonable in basic research
(Schmitt, 1996), despite traditional guidelines (Nunnally,
1978); therefore, we are confident in our results. How-
ever, future work might find out the variety of acts
committed in an act-frequency–nomination study (e.g.,
Jonason et al., 2009) and then subject these items to
factor analyses. This should improve scale alphas and
remove some experimenter bias. In addition, future
work should address other less-understood sexual acts
that may also not fit well into the apparent dichotomy,
such as ‘‘swinging’’ (Jenks, 1999).
Fourth, this study is limited in that it only used
single-point estimates of each relationship type. Future
research should attempt to conduct a long-term, daily
diary study where data is gathered that can track the
JONASON, LI, AND RICHARDSON
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course of the types of acts and feelings that characterize
booty-call relationships over time. If one can overcome
the difficulty of getting access to those who have just
started these relationships, this type of study would
prove informative. We would expect, as time passes,
the variety of sexual acts incorporated in booty-call
relationships should expand. We would also expect both
partners to develop more feelings over time, most
notably in women. Indeed, such a study would provide
insight into the workings of these relationships, why
they occur, and why they terminate or progress to
relationships of a more serious nature.
A necessary future direction is to further elucidate the
model set forth by Jonason et al. (2009) to booty-call
relationships and relationships in general. They suggest
that relationships are not preexisting entities but,
instead, are the result of negotiations—often implicit—
that partners go through in defining the parameters of
the relationships. Most individuals likely assume that
relationships are standard, but the reality is that every
relationship is different. They are different because of
this negotiation process. We suspect factors, like mate
value (e.g., Buss & Schmitt, 1993), to be of particular
importance in these negotiations. If we think of relation-
ships as the result of the ‘‘battle of the sexes,’’ then what
the individual brings to the negotiating table will dictate
their bargaining power. Alternatively, future work
should examine (a) whether booty-call type relationships
progress to long-term ones (b) and at least three specific
reasons individuals may engage in these relationship:
trial run, placeholder, and seeking stable social or
emotional support.
In conclusion, we have examined a relationship that
is garnering interest in the media and among some
researchers. In so doing, we have tried to address the
dearth of sexuality research between the two extremes
of one-night stands and serious committed relationships.
We have demonstrated how booty-call relationships are
composed of emotional and sexual aspects by assessing
the acts individuals commit and the association between
these acts and sociosexuality across different relation-
ship contexts. In sum, we have highlighted one more
color to the rainbow of human sexuality that has, until
now, been rather bichromatic.
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