The Whys of Mating: 237 Reasons and Counting
After asking nearly 2,000 people why they’d had sex, the researchers have assembled and categorized a total of 237 reasons — everything from “I wanted to feel closer to God� to “I was drunk.� They even found a few people who claimed to have been motivated by the desire to have a child.
The researchers, Cindy M. Meston and David M. Buss, believe their list, published in the August issue of Archives of Sexual Behavior, is the most thorough taxonomy of sexual motivation ever compiled. This seems entirely plausible.
Who knew, for instance, that a headache had any erotic significance except as an excuse for saying no? But some respondents of both sexes explained that they’d had sex “to get rid of a headache.� It’s No. 173 on the list.
Others said they did it to “help me fall asleep,� “make my partner feel powerful,� “burn calories,� “return a favor,� “keep warm,� “hurt an enemy� or “change the topic of conversation.� The lamest may have been, “It seemed like good exercise,� although there is also this: “Someone dared me.�
It’s an interesting article, with some stereotypes reinforced and others contradicted.
A related question: what’s the least convincing setup for characters bonking each other you’ve ever seen/read in films/books? Has anyone ever seen/read No. 173?
what’s the least convincing setup for characters bonking each other you’ve ever seen/read in films/books?
Any movie that features Adam Sandler.
[W]hat’s the least convincing setup for characters bonking each other you’ve ever seen/read in films/books?
Writer’s block.
In Guy Gavriel Kay’s Tigana, the Boy Hero has to hide in a closet with a fellow female traveller who doesn’t like him very much. She’s a member of a resistance group, and the other members of the resistance group are having a chat in the room in which they are hiding. In order to prevent Boy Hero from hearing any of their plans, she seduces him inside the confined space of the closet, without making any noise. Then it turns out that Boy Hero, by right of birth, is actually a part of the resistance movement anyway. For the most part, I think that Guy Gavriel Kay is an awesome writer, but this was just a stupid pretext for a gratuitous sex scene.
they’d had sex “to get rid of a headache.� It’s No. 173 on the list.
Seen it? I’ve lived it - no better hangover cure.
#173 happens, and it happens because it works. But I’ve never seen it used in fiction or on film.
Least convincing set-up: anything that’s happened so far on Torchwood.
The most celebrated example is probably John F Kennedy, who told British PM Harold Macmillan that he had to have sex every day to prevent crippling headaches.
Re: 173 - well, if the headache in question is some girl pestering me for sex, I get it.
For a literal headache, it seems only to work till about 30 seconds after the punchline, at which point the headache returns with a bunch of mates and a pneumatic drill.
2 Samuel 11.
As well as headache, #173 is great for girlie cramps too.
What’s news here? Orgasm is a great palliative as well as sleep-inducer. The gift from the gods.
But whilst it dampens the sensation of a headache, if you get too frisky the blood churning aggravates the headache as well!
Actually, I didn’t express myself clearly, but I was a bit bemused by the article’s emphasis on “people have sex to cure headaches? Who knew?” as I’ve certainly been aware of this piece of sexual lore for lo, many years: then I realised I couldn’t think of a single work of fiction, either visual or textual, which used curing headaches as a reason for horizontal gymnastics.
So I was curious as to whether others had ever run across the lore in fiction. I also thought some of the other reasons given in the study were fascinating in their own right.
[Link to full text of original report (pdf)]
The hero of Dorothy Dunnett’s Lymond Chronicles (highly recommended) occasionally uses bonking to avert the migraines that came in the wake of the opium addiction, but since it’s all happening in the 1550s, it tends to have other unintended consequences as well.
I am making these books sound much sleazier than they actually are.
Ahem.
The Lymond Chronicles.
The last 300 episodes of The Bill.
You make that sound like a bad thing.
Orgasms are good for headaches, period pain - pretty much whatever ails ye. Apart from orchalgia, natch.
The scene in “Happy Gilmore” where Sandler bonks the asian grandmother is a classic.
sounds like a worthy male lust object for a bodice ripper.
Fyody Boy — heh. I’m assuming you especially enjoyed the berserk Russian one. (For non-aficionadi, that’s Book 5: Lymond meets Ivan the Terrible.)
Those of us who have suffered from migraines know that nobody on the planet would want to have sex with you while you’ve got one. The whole lying-on-the-bathroom-floor-crying thing tends to be a bit of a turnoff.
I think my previous comment was mostly informed by my headaches being exclusively self-inflicted (or at least DD’s fault) - this new learning amazes me.
Not tonight darling, I feel fine?
Lamest excuse? How about (a) to get a Green Card, (b) to get a job at Star TV, and (c) because he was the head of News Ltd (in that order).
From an old friend:
“To stop him from talking about himself”.
Helps to answer deep and probing philosophical questions.
To encourage departure of visitors who have overstayed their welcome.
PC, I rejoice with all my heart when I find someone else who has read (and loves) Dunnett. It’s not an orgasm, but it’s pretty good!
“what’s the least convincing setup for characters bonking each other you’ve ever….read”
“Twas in SIT, SMH, about 10 years ago. Prior to the dumb down.
“A woman walks onto a Bar.
She asks the barman for a Double Entendre.
So he gives her one.”
Mme. Pavlova, I am nothing if not an aficionado of berserk Russians. Or Russian berserkers, for that matter.
P.S. interesting choice, if I may be so bold.
trusting stories about the efficacy of exotic aphrodisiacs
Huang O - 15th century, China
I believe it was mentioned as a character point to a juror named Jerry in John Grisham’s Runaway Jury. I believe that Jerry then proceeded to get off with a character whose name I can’t remember when the jury went into seclusion in order to assuage his raging pain.