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I am more than a little shocked that those numbers are so high. That's almost one in seven men! I guess it just goes to show how much society has conditioned

I am more than a little shocked that those numbers are so high. That's almost one in seven men! I guess it just goes to show how much society has conditioned me to believe that everyone is having sex. It's kind of a vicious cycle. If everyone believes everyone else has had sex, people will be less likely to admit (or at least bring up) that they haven't had sex, and so further contribute to the idea that everyone has had it.

jpeterson 17y ago
Nature needs us to have sex in order to continue the species, so it has built in very heavy biases to get us to do that. It's the number one imperative besides keeping ourselves alive. I believe that even for a reasonable person who is well practiced in recognizing biases in his own point of view, getting past all biases involving sex would be extremely difficult.
riffer 17y ago
The title is just linkbait: It's one in nine people 25-45 years old, which isn't quite as surprising as one in seven 40 year old men.
- rauljara 17y ago
  I'd be just as shocked if the title of the article only reference people over 25. Once you've been out of school for a few years, I imagine the odds of ending your virginity in any particular year goes way down. ie., a 25 year old virgin stand a pretty good chance of becoming a 40 year old one. A 20 year old virgin stands a pretty good chance of not being one for much longer. edit - Or so I'd expect, but this article has me questioning a lot of those expectations.
  - pgbovine 17y ago
    that would be a cool idea for a longitudinal study: re-survey the sample every year for 10-15 years
- MikeCapone 17y ago
  I didn't mean it as a bait (my first title attempt was too long, so I shortened it to that). I would edit it to say "25-45 yrs/old" if I could, but the 'edit' button is gone.
gaius 17y ago
Well you say that, but consider cultures where extra-marital sex is frowned on and men are allowed 4 wives. Then you'd see 75% of men virgins at 40. It is ridiculous for the original article to conflate prison and the military. If it's lower for veterans it's because girls like a man in uniform!
- eru 17y ago
  > Well you say that, but consider cultures where extra-marital sex is frowned on and men are allowed 4 wives. Then you'd see 75% of men virgins at 40. You have a point. I guess some men might have sex with other men as an escape. (That's what happens in American prisons. Though there it's more about power and abuse.)
  - qw 17y ago
    I don't think you can consider what goes on in prisons as sex. Most of the time it's rape. It is interesting to observe how Americans view sex in prison as if it was inevitable. If inmates were raped in my country, there would be an outrage. And the number of rapes in prison here are very close to zero (don't have the stats but I remember reading that it almost never happen). And this is a western European country, so in theory the culture should be relatively comparable.
    - mixmax 17y ago
      Europeans and Americans are more different than you think once you look a bit closer.
    - catzaa 17y ago
      In my country (South Africa) prison rape is also common. I've read a study (not going to search for it now) that the AIDS prevalence for people in prison actually goes down (which is suprising). A lot of sex in prison also isn't rape. The biggest cause for the rape problem in prisons is prison overcrowding (Europe doesn't have that problem at the scale of the USA or RSA). The problem is that the USA has a much higher incarceration rate than European countries.
kqr2 17y ago
Historically, maybe it's not so shocking. According to the article below, Today’s human population is descended from twice as many women as men...To get that kind of difference, you had to have something like, throughout the entire history of the human race, maybe 80% of women but only 40% of men reproduced. http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm

jpeterson 17y ago

Nature needs us to have sex in order to continue the species, so it has built in very heavy biases to get us to do that. It's the number one imperative besides keeping ourselves alive. I believe that even for a reasonable person who is well practiced in recognizing biases in his own point of view, getting past all biases involving sex would be extremely difficult.

riffer 17y ago

The title is just linkbait: It's one in nine people 25-45 years old, which isn't quite as surprising as one in seven 40 year old men.

rauljara 17y ago
I'd be just as shocked if the title of the article only reference people over 25. Once you've been out of school for a few years, I imagine the odds of ending your virginity in any particular year goes way down. ie., a 25 year old virgin stand a pretty good chance of becoming a 40 year old one. A 20 year old virgin stands a pretty good chance of not being one for much longer. edit - Or so I'd expect, but this article has me questioning a lot of those expectations.
- pgbovine 17y ago
  that would be a cool idea for a longitudinal study: re-survey the sample every year for 10-15 years
MikeCapone 17y ago
I didn't mean it as a bait (my first title attempt was too long, so I shortened it to that). I would edit it to say "25-45 yrs/old" if I could, but the 'edit' button is gone.

gaius 17y ago

Well you say that, but consider cultures where extra-marital sex is frowned on and men are allowed 4 wives. Then you'd see 75% of men virgins at 40. It is ridiculous for the original article to conflate prison and the military. If it's lower for veterans it's because girls like a man in uniform!

eru 17y ago
> Well you say that, but consider cultures where extra-marital sex is frowned on and men are allowed 4 wives. Then you'd see 75% of men virgins at 40. You have a point. I guess some men might have sex with other men as an escape. (That's what happens in American prisons. Though there it's more about power and abuse.)
- qw 17y ago
  I don't think you can consider what goes on in prisons as sex. Most of the time it's rape. It is interesting to observe how Americans view sex in prison as if it was inevitable. If inmates were raped in my country, there would be an outrage. And the number of rapes in prison here are very close to zero (don't have the stats but I remember reading that it almost never happen). And this is a western European country, so in theory the culture should be relatively comparable.
  - mixmax 17y ago
    Europeans and Americans are more different than you think once you look a bit closer.
  - catzaa 17y ago
    In my country (South Africa) prison rape is also common. I've read a study (not going to search for it now) that the AIDS prevalence for people in prison actually goes down (which is suprising). A lot of sex in prison also isn't rape. The biggest cause for the rape problem in prisons is prison overcrowding (Europe doesn't have that problem at the scale of the USA or RSA). The problem is that the USA has a much higher incarceration rate than European countries.

kqr2 17y ago

Historically, maybe it's not so shocking. According to the article below, Today’s human population is descended from twice as many women as men...To get that kind of difference, you had to have something like, throughout the entire history of the human race, maybe 80% of women but only 40% of men reproduced. http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm http://www.psy.fsu.edu/~baumeistertice/goodaboutmen.htm