The Kinsey Institute

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How Many People Share Sexts?

Texting (Salon)

You know you’ve thought about it. You get a sext from someone, and you want to get feedback from your friends, either on how hot this person is, or how to respond (or both). But do you take the plunge and share it?

Almost 1 in 4 people would choose to share it. A recent Indiana University (home of the famed Kinsey Institute) study, published in the online journal “Sexual Health,” surveyed 5K+ single people ages 21-75. For the purposes of this study, “sexting was defined as the transmission of sexual images and messages via cell phone or other electronic device.”

Of the respondents, despite 73% uncomfortable over sexts shared non-consensually, 23% reported that they shared said sexts. Clearly, there’s a breakdown of the sexting social contract: You may expect that the other person would not choose to share your sext, but that person might not be on the same wavelength. Good to keep in mind when sexting, everyone.

The study also highlighted a few other things that may be seen as common knowledge. Women are more likely to be upset if their sext gets shared than men are. Men are nearly 2X more likely to share sexts than women. Also, age correlated with perceived risk with regards to sexting. (Interestingly, the study doesn’t mention what age this thought process begins to take place.) Concerns over if and/or how sexting affected this group by 60-74%.

Trojan 2014 Sexual Health Report Card: By The Numbers

Trojan 2014 Sexual Health Report Card (via Twitter)

Earlier this year, Trojan (the condom brand, duh) released its 2014 Sexual Health Report Card. Now in its ninth year, the Report Card measures sexual health resources for 140 colleges selected from the Bowl Championship Series. Scoring categories include student health centers’ access to quality information, STI and HIV testing and condom and contraceptive availability, among other points.

This year, PAC-12 school Oregon State wrested the #1 spot from Princeton University. As the Report Card notes, the top spot has typically vacillated between the Ivy League and the Big Ten. The PAC-12 also took spots #4 (University of Arizona) and #5 (Stanford) in the top 10.

I wanted to see if there were any discernible patterns within the data, so I crunched some numbers and played with some pivot tables.

By College Conference:

Trojan Sexual Health Report Card 2014: College Conferences

The Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) took the top spot for conferences with 15 entries, and the Southeastern Conference (SEC) came in tied second with the Big Ten with 14 entries each. The Mid-American and PAC-12 conferences each have 12. Conference USA boasts 11 schools, and the American, Big 12 and Mountain West schools each have 10 schools.

The ACC, SEC and Ivy League all had each of its schools place within the rankings.

By School Type:

Trojan Sexual Health Report Card 2014: School Type

Over 76% of ranked schools were public schools, and 22% of schools were private. Ivies comprised over 25% of private schools listed.

Virginia Tech was categorized as public and military, and University of Pittsburgh was public and private.

By State:

Trojan Sexual Health Report Card 2014: States

Texas boasts 11 schools ranked, while Ohio has eight schools for second place. California and Florida tie with seven schools each. Louisiana has six, and Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, New York and North Carolina each have five schools represented.

On the other end of the scale, several states are one-hit wonders: Hawaii, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Washington D.C., and Wyoming.

By Region:

Trojan Sexual Health Report Card 2014: Region

Here’s something interesting: The South makes up 42%+ of the report’s regional breakdown. I didn’t expect that considering the region’s traditionally rocky relationship with sex education.

By contrast, the Northeast comprises only 14%+.

Past Winners:

In the report card’s nine years of age, Ivy League schools have taken the crown four times: Yale (2006, inaugural year), Columbia (2010 and 2011), and Princeton (2013).

Columbia and Princeton have previously topped the list despite not having school-wide Sex Weeks.

Some previous winners have precipitously descended the list since their banner year. University of Minnesota-Twin Cities made #1 in 2007, but has since slid to #24, a rate of 2.8+ spots per year. University of South Carolina-Columbia topped the list in 2009, and is now 29, sliding down the list at a much faster 5+ spots a year. Yale descended to #44 this year, sliding the fastest at 5.3+ spots per year.

Interesting Outliers:

Despite Trojan’s claim to show schools from all 50 states in their report, Alaska is conspicuously absent.

Only one HBCU (historically black college or university) made the cut: Savannah State University in Savannah, Georgia. The school came in at #133. Savannah State has made the list before, ranking #134 in 2013.

Indiana University-Bloomington checks in at #36. This wouldn’t be weird except the university houses the Kinsey Institute. You’d think sexual health would be a priority considering it’s apparently lucrative research.

Methodology:

Trojan outlined the criteria they look for within the report (and even leave room for extra credit), and they’ve ranked schools on a 4.0 scale before. I’d like to learn more transparency about how the different factors were selected and weighted in terms of priority.

One weird thing was that the University of Alabama was listed twice, ranked both #30 and #120. This was confusing and will need to be corrected for future report cards.

Final Thoughts:

I’d love to see more diversity of school represented. It’d be great to see other HBCUs (Spelman, Morehouse, etc.) and art schools (Pratt Institute, RISD, etc.). The National Center for Education Statistics puts the number of four-year colleges at 2.8K+ (as of 2010-2011), and it’d be fantastic to see a wider swath of schools surveyed.

Single Parents’ Sex Lives

Parent and child

A recent study jointly done by the University of Nevada and The Kinsey Institute examines the sex lives of single parents.

According to “The Huffington Post,” the study, which used data from the 2012 Singles in America findings, looked at 5K+ single Americans age 21 and over. Single parents comprised almost 39% of the sample size.

Participants were asked questions regarding the frequency of sexual thoughts and actually getting it on, as well as the number of people they’d dated and how many children they had. The timeframe appears to be limited to one year.

Researchers said that the single parents reported having the same amount of sex as singles without children. Also, single parents with children under age five had more sex than those with older children. These findings were published in the Journal of Sex Research.

However, the study doesn’t tell us what baseline was used for “normal” frequency of sexual intercourse and sexual thoughts. So we can’t really extrapolate much here.

Mutual Masturbation: How Common Is It?

Couple at sunset

I learned an interesting stat last night: According to The Kinsey Institute, 85% of men have masturbated with another person in the room, while 66% of women have done the same. The sex educator who told me this said the numbers were higher than previously thought, and could be higher still due to self-reporting.

What do you think? Are you surprised by these stats?

Losing It: Average Age of Virginity Loss in the U.S.

According to a 2006 study, men and women in the United States first experienced sexual intercourse at age 17 on average.

A 2007 study by Mathmatica Policy Research for The Kinsey Institute notes that 49% of women lose it by age 17, while 46% of men lose it by the same age.

Assuming this holds true with the population recorded in the 2010 Census, here’s how that would break down:

Women:

The 2010 census recorded over 10M women ages 10-14, and over 10.7M women ages 15-19. If we assumed that each age spreads equally (i.e. the same number of 10-year-olds as the number of 19-year-olds), there would be approximately 2M women for each age 10-14, and 2.140M women for each age 15-19.

Let’s also assume that virginity loss commences at adolescence, at age 13. Within the two age brackets, ranging ages 13-17, approximately 10.42M women have lost their virginities during this timeframe.

Putting the 10.42M over the combined age brackets totaling approximately 20.7M yields approximately 50%.

Men:

The 2010 census recorded over 10.5M men ages 10-14, and over 11.3M men ages 15-19. Again, we’re assuming that the various ages spreads equally: Approximately 2.1M men for each age 10-14, and 2.26M men for each age 15-19.

Again taking the 13-17 age range, approximately 10.98M men lose their virginities during this period. This amounts to approximately 50% of the combined age bracket range.

While the average age for virginity loss in women has stayed relatively flat in the three years since 2007 to 2010, men’s average age for the same rite of passage has risen slightly. This could be due to the fact that men are losing it slightly earlier within the age spread, or that there are simply more men within this age range.

Sex & Stats: Where Numbers Come to Bang

Statistics. Economics. Sex.