How normal is your sex drive?

Ian Kerner is a licensed psychotherapist, certified sexuality counselor and New York Times best-selling author. Read more from him on his website, iankerner. In fact, low desire in one partner is probably the top reason couples seek out sex therapy. Chat with us in Facebook Messenger.

(), % of men and % of women indicated that they had engaged in Men are also shown to have higher sex drive (Baumeister et al., ) the majority was involved in a dating relationship (n = ; %).

Sexual desire discrepancy, when one member of a couple experiences more or less sexual desire relative to their partner, is among the main reasons for couples to seek therapy. A great deal of prior research has examined the complexity of sexual desire and the role of sexual desire discrepancy in long-term relationships, but little research has specifically examined strategies used to mitigate sexual desire discrepancy when it arises.

Thus, the purpose of the present mixed methods study was to identify the strategies that individuals in long-term relationships use during times of desire discrepancy and to address whether the use of specific strategies influenced sexual and relationship satisfaction and sexual desire. We collected data from participants and our thematic content analysis produced 17 strategies, divided into five main groups disengagement, communication, engagement in activity alone, engagement in other activity with partner, and have sex anyway.

Specific strategies were associated with sexual and relationship satisfaction but not with sexual desire. Specifically, partnered strategies were associated with higher levels of sexual and relationship satisfaction compared to individual strategies. Additionally, participants who reported that their strategies were very helpful had higher levels of sexual and relationship satisfaction compared to participants who found them somewhat helpful followed by not at all helpful.

These results have implications for clinicians, educators, and researchers and highlight the importance of using effective strategies to deal with desire discrepancy and communicating about them in relationships. The use of effective strategies can have implications for overall couple well-being. However, relatively little attention has been paid to the strategies people in long-term relationships use when only one partner is interested in sexual activity.