Is it true that women’s sexual desire fluctuates over time, while men’s remains stable? A series of three longitudinal studies published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior tested this common assumption. Findings revealed that over the short-term, there were no sex differences, while over the long-term, women more so than men experienced variability in sexual desire.
“I was broadly interested in how sexual desire changes over time. People have been studying sexual desire as a state that can be fluid, which in itself is interesting to me,” said Dr. Emily A. Harris, a post-doctoral research fellow at the University of Melbourne.
“But it was apparent that there were some gendered assumptions about how fluid desire can be. Just like there is a stereotype that women are more emotionally volatile than men, there is a stereotype that women’s desire is more volatile than men’s. I should mention there was also some credible psychological theorising supporting this assumption. But, as with all assumed sex-differences, it’s important to empirically test them.”
Study 1 utilized data from a three wave Finnish population twin study which spanned 13 years. Wave 1 data was collected in 2006, followed by Wave 2 data in 2012-2013 and Wave 3 data in 2019. Data that spans an extended period of time allows for the consideration of biological variables, such as childbirth and menopause, which can influence sexual desire. The total sample included 1854 participants. Sexual desire was assessed using three items from the Sexual Desire Inventory (e.g., When you have sexual thoughts, how strong is your desire to engage in sexual behavior with a partner?).
Study 2 included heterosexual couples with an average relationship length of 2.61 years, for a total of 224 participants. They completed six 1-2-minute daily surveys assessing moment-to-moment changes in sexual desire; partners received the surveys at the same time. Survey questions assessed for partner specific desire (i.e., How much sexual desire do you feel for your partner right now?), happiness, mental and physical exhaustion, stress, and relationship-oriented states (e.g., closeness or anger with partner).
Study 3 focused on general desire, rather than partner-specific desire, among both individuals in relationships and not in relationships. Here, the researchers could test whether relationship status moderated the relationship between sex and variability in sexual desire. A total of 255 participants were included in the final dataset. Participants responded to a series of questions assessing momentary sexual desire (e.g., “How much do you feel like having sex at this moment?”), felt tiredness, stress, and attractiveness, as well as relationship-oriented states for those who were in a relationship (e.g., emotional closeness and loneliness).
Harris and colleagues reported that in the long-term, women’s sexual desire was significantly more variable than men’s. Notably, this effect was small, such that the overlap in women’s and men’s distribution in sexual desire far exceeded the differences. Further, childbirth did not explain the fluctuation in women’s sexual desire.
Interestingly, there were no sex differences over the short-term, with both sexes showing large fluctuations in their experienced sexual desire. This finding is at odds with the assumption that men experience stable sexual desire across time. In examining the effects of affective and relationship-oriented states on sexual desire, the researchers found that this was similar for men and women, with one exception: Study 2 revealed that women’s desire was negatively associated with tiredness and anger.
“Broadly, it’s common for people to experience changes in their sexual desire. There are lots of factors contributing to our desire, like tiredness, and how we feel about our partners. So, it’s important that people not beat themselves up about having peaks and troughs in their desire,” Harris told PsyPost.
“More specifically, I’d like people to note that men’s desire is not necessarily as stable as we might think it might be, or should be. Men’s desire, just like women’s desire, can ebb and flow, and is tied to how they feel in their bodies and in their relationships.”
With regard to study limitations, the researcher said, “Our study focused on testing sex differences in sexual desire variability. Additional work is needed to explore gender differences, ideally across multiple dimensions of gender, including non-binary people. Other remaining questions include, ‘why might sexual desire vary more among women than men over the long term?’ and ‘how does desire vary over the medium-term, over weeks and months?’”
Harris added, “I am a big fan of testing lay theories about gender and sex differences. Often, sex-differences are exaggerated – typically, there are more similarities than there are differences. It can help to relieve some of the social pressures for women and men to ‘be’ a certain way if we remember that there is so much diversity and overlap across these categories (and of course that there are more than two categories!).”
The paper, “Does Sexual Desire Fluctuate More Among Women than Men?”, was authored by Emily A. Harris, Matthew J. Hornsey, Wilhelm Hofmann, Patrick Jern, Sean C. Murphy, Fanny Hedenborg, and Fiona K. Barlow.
