Ms. Christian Grey? Study Tells Women To Take Charge During Sex
A Yale University study says traditional gender roles can hurt your sex life.
If you think it's a George of the Jungle you're looking for in the bedroom, think again.
Despite our fantasies of Don Draper or Christian Grey, it's most likely a Michael Cera type who will be able to satisfy us the most sexually. A new Yale University study published in the Sex Roles journal (yes, that exists) found that men who believe they need to be dominant during playtime are less comfortable asking women about their sexual needs and discussing their own.
The study surveyed 357 women and 126 men ages 18 to 29, all heterosexual and sexually active, on their sexual confidence and assertiveness.
Turns out that adhering to traditional gender roles could damage a man's confidence — and make him less likely to use protection. In the survey room, there was a bowl of female condoms with a sign that read: "Protect yourself and your partner. Please take some! Free Female Condoms." The more the subjects believed in traditional power dynamics, the less they were likely to take the condoms.
But before we start arguing it's all the men's fault, women who play a traditional feminine role in the bedroom also reported lower sexual confidence — and were less likely to grab a free condom on their way out of the interview. I mean, c'mon. Even if you're not going to use it, those things are expensive. Take! You know you want to.
"For both women and men, the belief that men should dominate sexually could reduce interest in female condoms, because female condoms are meant to be a woman-centered source of protection and may be seen as violating the norm or belief that men should be in control of sexual situations," the researchers explained.
I can confirm that guys don't always know what we need in bed and should maybe look up and ask us every now and again. But I must admit that we females don't always know either. That's when our fantasy of Mr. Draper and Mr. Grey kicks in hardcore. It's like listening to the radio. It might not be as good as selecting our own songs, but sometimes we just don't want to do the work of figuring out what it is we want to listen to. Just provide us with some decent, bubble-gum entertainment!
Overall, the survey showed that it was men more than women who were fixated on the traditional masculine role in the bedroom: "Female subjects in general were less likely than the men to believe that men should be more dominate in sexual situations." Relax, little boys. We love you just the same, as long as we get to experience both sides of the power dynamic.
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