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A new study published in the journal Sexes has explored the relationship between rapidly changing moods, boredom, mindfulness, and the number of sexual partners women have had in the past year. The researchers found that women who reported experiencing rapid shifts between feelings of depression and elation tended to have more sexual partners, particularly if they also reported a lower tendency to observe their thoughts and sensations.
The researchers were interested in this topic because rapid changes in mood, known as affective lability, are associated with a range of mental health conditions, including borderline personality disorder, bipolar disorder, eating disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder. Previous research has also shown that people with higher affective lability tend to have a greater number of sexual partners. A higher number of sexual partners can increase the risk of negative outcomes, such as sexually transmitted infections and unplanned pregnancies. The researchers wanted to understand the factors that might explain this link.
One potential factor is boredom. People who are prone to boredom might experience it more intensely and negatively, and this could lead them to engage in impulsive behaviors, including seeking out sexual encounters, to alleviate their discomfort. On the other hand, mindfulness – the practice of paying attention to the present moment without judgment – has been shown to help people regulate their emotions and reduce impulsive behavior.
The researchers hypothesized that mindfulness might help individuals with rapid mood swings and a tendency towards boredom to better tolerate these difficult states, reducing the urge to engage in sex as a coping mechanism. Since the potential negative impacts of casual sex are higher for women, and since women may be perceived as more emotionally expressive, the researchers decided to focus exclusively on a sample of women.
To investigate these relationships, the researchers recruited a sample of 469 adult women through online communities and a university participant pool. The average age of the participants was 25 years, and the majority identified as White and heterosexual.
Participants completed an online survey that included several questionnaires. The Affective Lability Scale measured how often and intensely participants experienced rapid shifts in their emotions. This scale specifically assessed shifts between feeling normal and feeling anxious/depressed, feeling normal and feeling angry, and feeling depressed and feeling elated/energetic. The Boredom Proneness Scale assessed participants’ general tendency to experience boredom.
To measure mindfulness, the researchers used the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire. This questionnaire assesses five different aspects of mindfulness: observing thoughts and feelings, describing experiences, acting with awareness (rather than being on “autopilot”), non-judging of inner experiences, and non-reactivity to inner experiences.
Finally, participants were asked to report the number of sexual partners they had had in the past 12 months. The survey also collected information on participants’ relationship status, age, and whether they had sex with people of any gender or only one gender.
The study’s initial prediction, that boredom proneness and mindfulness would together influence the link between affective lability and number of sex partners, was not supported by the data. However, when the researchers explored other possible relationships, they found an interesting result. Among women who reported experiencing rapid changes between feeling depressed and elated, those who scored lower on the “Observe” aspect of mindfulness reported having a greater number of sexual partners in the past year.
In simpler terms, this means that for women who experience significant mood swings between depression and elation, being less inclined to notice and pay attention to their current thoughts and feelings was associated with having more sexual partners. This finding suggests that the ability to simply observe one’s inner experiences, without judgment or reaction, might be relevant in understanding sexual behavior in individuals with affective lability.
The researchers offered several possible explanations for why their initial predictions were not confirmed and why this specific finding emerged. They suggested that perhaps sensation-seeking, the desire for exciting and novel experiences, might be a stronger factor than general boredom proneness in driving impulsive sexual behavior in affectively labile women. They also pointed out that simply counting the number of sex partners might not fully capture impulsive sexual behavior. Some individuals might engage in impulsive sex infrequently, or in ways that don’t necessarily involve multiple partners. Future research could use measures that specifically assess out-of-control sexual behavior or sexual risk-taking to get a more complete picture.
The researchers also acknowledged several limitations of their study. The majority of participants were young and White, which limits how broadly the findings can be applied to other populations. A significant portion of participants were in dating relationships or not sexually active, which could have affected the range of responses regarding sexual partners. The study focused only on women, so it’s unclear if these findings would apply to men as well. Furthermore, the study design was cross-sectional, meaning it looked at data at one point in time, so it cannot prove cause and effect.
Despite these limitations, the study highlights a potentially important link between a specific facet of mindfulness – the ability to observe inner experiences – and sexual behavior in women who experience rapid mood changes between depression and elation. Future research could explore this finding further, perhaps by investigating whether mindfulness-based interventions can help individuals better manage their mood fluctuations and reduce impulsive sexual behaviors.
The study, “The Roles of Affective Lability, Boredom, and Mindfulness in Predicting Number of Sex Partners within Women,” was authored by by Carolyn A. Lorenzi, David C. de Jong, and Rachel S. Faulkenberry.
