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Dating, Age and Statistics
May 28, 2010
The statistics in this blog post from the OKCupid.com dating site are questionable, but the charts are fun, and I like the author’s conclusions. Interesting reading!
Happy Masturbation Month!
May 27, 2010
How do you plan to celebrate the last weekend of National Masturbation Month?
The majority of people either masturbate or have done it at some time in their life — enough so that a month-long celebration was initiated several years ago. Self-pleasure cannot lead to pregnancy, sexually transmitted infection, or heartbreak. The only harm that comes from masturbation is due to the stigma that makes some people feel that they are doing something shameful if they enjoy touching their own bodies. Or the criminal record that may follow masturbating in public, but that’s an entirely different issue.
Recent research has found:
- 70 to 95% of adult men and women masturbate
- 46% of adults over 65 masturbate
- 20% of senior citizens masturbate once a week or more.
Masturbation offers comfort, deepens sleep, enhances sexual confidence, maintains blood flow to the genitals (and lubrication, in women), and exercises pelvic floor muscles. If it leads to orgasm, masturbation has the added impact of offering up to 24-hours of pain relief. Masturbation is also a great way to learn how to build arousal, maintain arousal, and what it takes to experience orgasm. Once you know how to please yourself, you can teach a partner what you like by allowing that person to watch you or by guiding a partner’s hand, mouth or body.
No props or tools are required for masturbation — many people rely on their hands, a powerful shower or bath jet, a pillow for rubbing against, etc. If you enjoy a little extra ooomph, toys are available for both males and females. You can learn more about some of these toys here. For women who have never experienced an orgasm with or without a partner, my brochure, Taking the Mystery Out of Female Orgasm, can be helpful. The brochure can be useful for partners, too.
While National Masturbation Month is a reason to celebrate, don’t let June’s arrival prevent you from continuing your self-explorations — self-pleasure can be a year-round activity.
Tips for Talking with Kids about Masturbation
May 27, 2010
May is National Masturbation Month, so this is a good opportunity to think about the messages you’d like to give your children about self-pleasure.
Masturbation is a normal activity participated in by children at very young ages—even male fetuses have even been observed grabbing their penises. But knowing masturbation is normal and dealing with it in your home are two different things. It’s easy to ask a child to keep self-exploration private; it’s more difficult when your child is “doing exercises,” as my friend’s child put it, in the living room when guests visit.
Why does talking about masturbation make so many parents uncomfortable, despite surveys that show the majority of people either masturbate or have done it at some time in their life? There’s no medical reason to be concerned: self-pleasure cannot lead to pregnancy, sexually transmitted infection, or heartbreak. The harm that comes from masturbation is due to the stigma that makes people feel that they are doing something shameful if they enjoy touching their own bodies.
During the Victorian era, masturbation was seen as a sign of weak moral fiber. Presbyterian minister Sylvester Graham invented his famous crackers to suppress sexual urges, and Dr. John H. Kellogg invented the original, sugar-free corn flakes to prevent the urge to masturbate. Those were innocuous “cures,” but other preventive methods were scary: bizarre devices were sold to stop children and teens from touching their genitals and to punish them for having “unnatural” sexual urges. Some parents forced their children to wear spiked metal vises that scratched the genitals upon arousal or pinched fingers that attempted to touch those areas. Some children had their foreskin or clitoris removed as punishment for masturbation.
Why Teach Kids about Self-Pleasure?
- Young children benefit from hearing that it’s normal to explore their bodies and learn how they work.
- Parents can encourage children to appreciate their bodies without embarrassment, albeit in private.
- Masturbation can be a self-comforting behavior when children cannot sleep.
- Children can gain a sense of ownership about their bodies when they give themselves sexual pleasure. When they do become sexually active with a partner later in life, their sexual self-awareness will help them to communicate their needs to their partners so they can enjoy a more satisfying sexual relationship.
- Masturbation allows adolescents and teens to relieve sexual urges without a partner and with no sexual health risks.
Teaching Sex-Positive Attitudes
If you want to encourage positive attitudes about masturbation, start by looking at your own feelings. What messages did you receive about it from your family, friends or religious tradition? Are those the messages you want your child to receive? If not, why not? Talk about masturbation with your co-parent to ensure you’re on the same page where the kids are concerned.
Let your infant touch his or her genitals during diaper changes. Let your toddler unabashedly explore while washing all of his or her body parts, and take the opportunity to teach the proper names for genitals (Note to parents of girls: Remember that the vagina is on the inside; the vulva is everything the outside). You can make casual comments that let older children know masturbation is normal and healthy—they may act disgusted to hear the words, but they’ll internalize the message. Do your child a great service by saying, “I promise never to walk in on you in the bathroom or your bedroom when the door is closed unless I knock first.”
In the book, “It’s So Amazing” for young children, masturbation is mentioned in a section on kinds of touch. The book explains what masturbation is, acknowledges that many people do it and many don’t, and it explains that many families have different attitudes about masturbation. It also says that most doctors agree is normal and healthy. For adolescents, “Sex, Puberty and All that Stuff” has separate sections for boys and girls that include information about masturbation. I like the passage that states that nearly everyone masturbates even though few people talk about. The book also mentions that while masturbation is usually done in private, couples can enjoy it, too. Messages like this can help keep sexually active teens healthy by teaching them a risk-free alternative to activities that expose them to sexually transmitted infection and pregnancy.
Is it easy to talk about masturbation with your children? Not necessarily, but by putting your own embarrassment aside, you will continue the process of helping your child become a sexually confident and happy adult.
Parts of this post were adapted from my book “Sexuality Talking Points,” which can be purchased on my Products page.
Is Puberty Making Your Son More Aggressive?
May 14, 2010
The arrival of body hair, voice changes, acne, and sudden erections can cause adolescent boys embarrassment and concern, but these changes may be easier to manage than those that come with early or late puberty.
Penn State researchers have learned that when puberty arrives earlier or later than usual, boys experience emotional and behavioral issues that can cause problems for them and for others. This news provides even more incentive for parents to be aware of their sons’ sexual development.
In an article in ScienceDaily, Penn State researcher Elizabeth J. Susman was quoted as saying, “This is the first study to show that the timing of puberty moderates biological risks of antisocial behavior. The implication is that parents should be especially sensitive to picking up signs of earlier or later puberty in their children…Parents and healthcare providers should be aware of how puberty can be stressful — behaviorally and biologically — on kids.”
Puberty is a life stage when the body changes physically from childhood to early adulthood, i.e., when it is capable of sexual reproduction. Boys typically begin puberty at age 12, while girls begin the process at age 10. In males, the brain releases hormones that trigger the hormone production in the testes, stimulating the maturation of muscles, bones, skin, the brain, and the sexual and reproductive organs. As puberty progresses, secondary sex characteristics become apparent, including body and facial hair, a triangular torso shape as shoulders broaden, and the deepening of the voice.
As reported in the May 2010 issue of Psychoneuroendocrinology, both early- and late-onset male puberty can cause the brain to release extra cortisol, which is a stress hormone. The researchers speculate that when higher levels of cortisol combine with testosterone (the primary male sex hormone) the result can be undesirable behavior. This was not found to be an issue in girls.
Boys who enter puberty early tend to have more problems with rule breaking and conduct disorder. They were also more aggressive than boys who enter puberty later. On the flip side, boys who enter puberty later tend to behave in an antisocial manner.
Timing the Sex Talk
Parents often wait to discuss sexual development and behavior until their sons reach age 12, on the assumption that children are better off not thinking about sexuality until it’s absolutely necessary. The study findings, however, indicate that parents need to time conversations by a son’s development rather than his calendar age.
While adolescents may look forward to being teens, they do no intuitively understand the physical and emotional changes they’ll have to go through first. And, while they may learn about puberty in school, adolescents often lack the emotional maturity to apply the information to themselves. You can help your son adjust by talking about puberty long before you expect it to begin. Saying, “Soon, you’ll be a young man” won’t cut it. He needs to know about what kinds of changes he will experience and what the affects may be.
Some boys sail through the changes with relative ease, while others struggle to adjust. Typically, when puberty begins, your son’s hair or skin may be oilier than usual. He may quickly outgrow his clothing, or his features may be changing slightly as he puts on weight. He may seek more awkward than usual as he adapts to his changing body. If this begins earlier than expected he may also struggle with the hormonal wash mentioned earlier, i.e., cortisol (stress) and testosterone (growth and aggression). If he begins puberty later than expected, the most obvious sign may be that his peers appear to be maturing at a much faster rate. He may look like a boy compared to a growing number of friends who appear more like young men. That may be a factor leading to the antisocial behavior reported in the study.
As the Penn State study found, early or late puberty adds a level of stress to the mix of these already tremendous developmental changes. There is no guarantee that explaining puberty to your son will change his behavior, but it makes sense that knowing what’s going on will ease some of his the stress and worry. In turn, you may get to see once again your son’s kinder side.
Hooking Up but Wanting to Date
May 14, 2010
A new study finds that college students actually would like to date, but they actually hook up at about twice as often as they date.
Definitions for “hooking up” range from kissing an acquaintance or stranger to having sexual intercourse. For this study’s purposes, the researchers defined a hookup as sexual intercourse that occurs once, with a stranger or casual acquaintance (as opposed to an on-going relationship).
The undergrads aren’t necessarily hooking up because it feels good. Rather, say the researchers from James Madison University, the students hook up because they think their peers are doing it and enjoying it. And yet, 95% of female students would rather date than hook up, while 77.5% of men prefer dating to hookups.
The researchers posited that dating seems more emotionally risky than hookups, i.e., a broken heart can cut to be very painful, while a drunken sexual encounter can be waived off as a stupid mistake. And most hookups occur when alcohol is involved.
The study was small, but it resonates with the stories my undergraduate students have shared with me. When out partying, both males and females have taken risks they might not take when sober. Condom use isn’t a sure thing when someone is horny and drunk.
Perhaps this study is a good reminder that adolescence lasts until age 24, which means that most college students don’t have the mental maturity to unpack the risks of acting on the basis of peer pressure rather than one’s personal preference.