- Men are more likely to exaggerate the amount of people who they've had sex with — sometimes up to twice as much.
- Statistically, this gender gap shouldn't be as wide as it is.
- A new study points to some of the possible reasons for the disparity.
- For example, men are more likely to "estimate" their number, while women are more precise.
- There are also social stigmas at play, such as the fear of being "sex shamed."
At some point in a relationship, you might be asked how many sexual partners you've had. It's completely up to you if you want to divulge this information, but it's one of those awkward questions that may come up.
But don't expect an honest answer.
As pointed out in a new study published in The Journal of Sex Research, the average number of opposite-sex partners men and women report should be equal — but they're not. In all surveys, men report more.
The new study, led by Kirstin Mitchell at the University of Glasgow, looked into some of the possible reasons for this supposed "gender gap" between the numbers men and women report. They assessed the data from the National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles — a survey of over 15,000 Brits age 16 to 74 — which revealed men said they'd had an average of 14 female sexual partners, and women said they'd had seven male partners.
Men at the top end of the scale reported 110 or more partners, while women reported 50 or more. This skewed the results a bit, and excluding these results made the gender gap smaller, the researchers said.
Also, the gap was made smaller still when the team considered "accounting strategy." This is the fact men are more likely to estimate their number of partners, while women prefer to count. For example, when someone was reporting 5 to 9 partners, 24% of men estimated compared to 15% of women.
Sexual attitudes could also have an impact on the results. For instance, women were found to be more sexually conservative — less likely to view one night stands as "not wrong at all." They were also more likely to view cheating in marriages as "always wrong."
Another potential explanation is men being more likely to pay for sex, but they concluded the impact was minor.
Women are also more likely to be "sex shamed" by their peers, which is looking down or criticising them for their sexual behaviour. It's also sometimes known as "slut shaming," which psychologists have determined is misogynistic and self-serving. It not only allows men to judge women for their choices, but makes women compete with each other over their "purity" too.
Whatever the reasons for the gender gap, it's important to know your partner's sexual history, said Mitchell.
"Accurate reporting of sexual partners is crucial for many reasons, including assessing individual risk of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) and estimating the rate of STI/HIV transmission," she said.
"Most existing studies of reporting bias are limited to students or high-risk populations, or are conducted as 'laboratory' settings, so they don't show how members of the public respond in a 'real-life' survey. To our knowledge, our study is the first attempt to look at all the key types of explanation for the gender discrepancy within the same large and representative sample."
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