How Often Do We Lie About Sex?
Sex Roles: A Journal About Research recently published a study about men and women’s tendencies to lie about their sexual histories.
This type of research has been conducted a number of times in the past, and the research team wanted to see if changing attitudes about gender sexuality have affected how we currently talk about our histories.
The research team at Ohio State University asked heterosexual college students about the number of sexual partners they have had.
The team found that men were more likely to add one sexual partner to their “number”, while women were more likely to subtract one.
Researchers then hooked study participants up to a lie detector machine, and found, somewhat unsurprisingly, that the participants were more likely to tell the truth.
The findings were essentially the same as when the study was conducted a decade ago, aside from a few interesting tidbits.
The Ohio State team found that the women who were hooked up to the lie detector ended up admitting to having far more sexual partners than the men. This disparity had not been found in the past.
The study also asked its participants about other stereotypically gendered behaviors such as changing car tires, dressing masculinely or femininely, and writing poetry. They found that men and women alike more readily acknowledged participating in behaviors that are not stereotypically associated with their own gender.
It’s interesting to note that as a society we are becoming more flexible about gender roles, but rather unchanging in how we talk about sexual history.