1026
Females
7%
29%
45%
5%
14%
In other words, 27% of college males say they would have sex
with a casual acquaintance and all the other categories; 39% say they
would have sex with a friend (and the others in the Table to the right),
and, thus, a total of 66% would not consider sex to mean "I love you."
About half as many (36%) females say they would have sex with a
friend (or acquaintance) but 64% (80% of teenaged women) say they
would wait until love and perhaps some commitment was present. Yet,
42% of teenaged females want the male to touch their breasts within
the first two weeks of dating. Being very willing to cooperate, one-
third of teenaged males say they want intercourse within the first two
weeks, 50% within a month and 80+% want sex if "in love" (Hass,
1979). Obviously, "friends" develop very rapidly under these
conditions.
You might be asking yourself, "So what?" This research data may
merely tell us what men have always known, namely, to "score" you
have to become friends first and maybe, if she's really conservative,
convince her that you love her. On the other hand, the data may
reflect the current status of the old conflicting traditions, namely,
casual sex is wonderful (old male role) and intercourse should only be
with someone you love (old and current female role). It is unknown
how these conflicting sexual attitudes will be resolved in the future.
How many women in 2010 will accept casual sex? How many men will
chose to save sex for loving relationships? We don't know. Perhaps it
doesn't matter.
Frankly, I suspect that many young people are not living according
to their morals. For instance, I wonder how many junior high students,
who haven't had sex, believe premarital sex during high school is
immoral, but yet have sex before they are out of school? In the Janus
and Janus (1993) surveys, 70+% of "very religious" adults admit they
had premarital sex (30% have had extramarital affairs too). Do we
pay a price for disregarding our morals or do our morals change as we
"fall in love" or do we easily dismiss our morals after losing them?
Actually, 35% to 45% of religious people believe women should have
sexual experience before marriage. We don't factually know the
probable consequences of many actions... but we need to know. My
advice: if your morals are strong, do not break them without careful
consideration.
In any case, regardless of the sexual decisions your peers make,
your sexual activity is your own personal decision and a very
important one. Your sexual decisions may influence your self-esteem,
your reputation, who your friends are, who you marry and how good
the marriage is, when you become a parent, your career, how you get
along with your parents, how many marriages you have, and many
other things.
