Here is why couples who communicate more about sex tend to have better sex
There seems to be a vital connection between conversing about sex and having good sex – especially for females.
According to a recent study by The Journal of Sex Research, partners who communicate more tend to enjoy better sex lives.
“One line of my research focuses on couples’ sexual communication and its benefits for romantic relationships. In reviewing the literature, I recognized that sexual communication is often discussed in papers that focus on sexual functioning, but there had not been a review about how strongly sexual communication was related to sexual function,” said study leader Allen B. Mallory of the University of Texas at Austin.
“My co-authors, who are experts in the sexual function field, had also noticed a lack of studies examining dyadic factors in research on sexual function. We decided to join our interests to embark on this research project.”
A meta-analysis was conducted of 48 past studies which included measures of couples’ sexual communication and multiple other aspects of sexual functioning, such as arousal, erection, desire, lubrication, pain, and orgasm. Participants numbered 12145 in total.
“Talking with a partner about sexual concerns seems to be associated with better sexual function. This relationship was most consistent for orgasm function and overall sexual function — and uniquely related to women’s sexual desire,”
“That is, for both men and women, talking about sex with their partners was associated with better orgasm and greater overall sexual well-being. For women specifically, sexual communication with a partner was related to increased sexual desire,” Mallory told PsyPost.
The connection between sexual satisfaction and communication was also stronger in studies where the couples were married.
However, this study – like any other research – has its own limitations.
“The first caveat is that many of these effects were small. This suggests that, while sexual communication is important for some domains of sexual function, it is part of a larger combination of factors that facilitate sexual health,” Mallory explained.
“The second caveat is that the relationships demonstrated in the paper are correlations, so the direction of causality is unclear. Though sexual communication may ’cause’ greater sexual function, it is also possible that people who are more sexually functional have better communication with their partner.”
“Last, although our study establishes that there are generally consistent positive correlations between sexual communication and better sexual function, our study does not elaborate on why the two are related,”
“Much more research is needed to address the ways in which couple-level factors, like sexual communication, help or hinder sexual function. We hope that our study will be a starting point for researchers interested in exploring this area.” she added.
