2014/03/10 by Susan Sprecher · 1 citation
Health Professions · Psychology · Medicine · #Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health #Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology #Sexual function and dysfunction studies #Psychology #Sexual intercourse #Pleasure #Human sexuality #Anxiety #Normative #Developmental psychology #Young adult #Demography #Clinical psychology #Population #Psychiatry #Gender studies
paper · doi:10.1080/00224499.2013.867923
openalex publication_date 2014/03/10 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
With a large sample (N = 5,769) of university students obtained over a 23-year period (1990-2012), which represented three decades of first sexual intercourse experiences, the present study examined gender differences in pleasure, anxiety, and guilt in response to first intercourse. Men reported more pleasure and anxiety than women, and women reported more guilt than men. Anxiety decreased over the three decades for men; pleasure increased and guilt decreased for women. As a result of these changes, the differences between men and women in emotional reactions decreased slightly over time. The magnitude of the gender differences overall and in the most recent years of data collection, however, suggests that emotional responses to first sexual intercourse should be included in a small list of sexuality variables that are exceptions to Hyde's ( 2005 ) gender similarities hypothesis.