If Hair Balls ever approached a bunch of cougars (the human kind) and asked a series of questions about their sexual fantasies and escapades, we’d probably get pepper-sprayed. But when a team of researches at the University of Texas-Austin did it, they got published.
In an article in this month’s edition of the catchily titled Personality and Individual Differences, psych grad students and a psych professor reveal that, as women’s fertility wanes, their sexual activities increase.
According to the study, which asked R-rated questions of women in
three age groups, “compared with the other groups, women with low
fertility were more likely to experience frequent sexual fantasies,
thoughts about sexual activities, more intense sexual fantasies than
their younger counterparts, a more active sex life and willingness to
have a one-night stand, [and] a willingness to have casual sex.” (Hair
Balls wasn’t interviewed for the study, but if we had been, our response
would have been “Awwwww, yeah!”)
We tried to reach Judith Easton, one of the grad students, but she
was unavailable. However, she did state in a press release that “our
findings suggest that women don’t need to necessarily go ‘baby crazy’ in
their 30s or go around thinking they’re supposed to be having a ‘sexual
peak.’ Our results suggest there is nothing special about the 30s, but
that instead these behaviors manifest in all women with declining
fertility. It may be more difficult to conceive past the age of 35, but
our research suggests women’s psychology will continue to motivate them
to try until menopause.”
Besides giving hope to the thousands of men who post pics of their
junk online, the study helps us understand “the changes in women’s
reproductive behavior across the life cycle from an evolutionary
standpoint,” according to the press release.
Which appears to be
a scientific way of saying that, the older women get, the more they want
to get it on. It’s making us think of Angela Lansbury in a whole new
light.
This article appears in Jul 8-14, 2010.
