THE ESSENTIAL
- Half of those surveyed believed that viewing sex as a hobby – with gadgets, love games, etc. – was a good way to deal with the pandemic.
- Between February and May 2021, 13% of respondents have tried sexual role-playing games.
It’s a very intimate question that depends on many factors: the quality of the sexual relations. According to work published in the journal Leisure Sciencespeople for whom the sexual act was considered a leisure activity during the Covid-19 crisis had a more fulfilling intimate life.
Sex, a component of well-being during Covid-19
“When sexual activity is pleasurable, freely chosen and motivated, it is equivalent to most leisure activities, explains Liza Berdychevsky, one of the authors, in a communiqué. Seeing sex as a hobby affects sexual inhibitions, attitudes and practices, and it confirms that sexual health is one of the keys to our overall well-being and quality of life.“.
To carry out their work, the researchers relied on a survey carried out between February and May 2021 among 675 adults aged 18 to 76 living in the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. 68% of respondents had a regular sexual partner while 12% had an occasional one.
Sex minimizes the negative effects of the Covid-19 crisis
First lesson: people who had sex for pleasure experienced more sexual desire compared to people who did not consider sex to be relaxing or fun. Their reports were also more frequent and, according to them, of better quality, with a greater variety of sexual practices.
“Seeing sex as a hobby minimized the negative effects of the pandemic on people’s sex lives and was linked to a greater ability to reach orgasm, more sexual intimacy but also more touching and caressingdeveloped by Liza Berdychevsky. These people spent more time with their partner (related to containment and restriction of other activities) and devoted it to sexual intimacy, communication and experimentation. This approach may have been a way for people and couples to feel both safer and more adventurous in their sex lives during a rather scary time.”.
More time and freedom in sex to better live the pandemic
Second conclusion of the researchers: some people have precisely used sex as a means of better overcoming the period of the pandemic. In fact, two-thirds of respondents believed that sex as a source of pleasure helped them relieve stress, distract themselves and pass the time. In detail, 20% have fulfilled their sexual fantasies, 41% have tried new positions, 26% have tested sex toys and 18% have tried bondage or domination.
According to the researchers, the idea that people have of sex was therefore linked to the way in which their intimacy evolved – for better or for worse – during the Covid-19 crisis. “These results demonstrate that viewing sex as a hobby may have been a protective factor against the adverse effects of the pandemic on people’s sex lives, concluded by Liza Berdychevsy. The decline in this tendency to view sex as a form of leisure activity is a risk factor that can be problematic for well-being, as it relates to all aspects of sexuality, including sexual desire, intimacy and satisfaction“.