Episode 196: When Women Are (and Aren’t) Into Casual Sex

Sex and Psychology Podcast

Imagine a woman wanders around a college campus and asks 100 different men at random whether they’d have sex with her. Now imagine a man wandering around the same campus asking 100 women for sex. How many people do you think would agree in each case? It turns out that we have the answers because this exact study has been done before! Today’s show is going to be all about how people respond to offers of casual sex from strangers, and how the results are similar or different across persons of different genders and sexualities.

Some of the specific topics we discuss include:

• Why are women less likely to accept offers of casual sex than men?
• Under what circumstances are women most likely to accept offers of casual sex?
• What would happen if a celebrity (vs. a random stranger) asked you for casual sex?
• What is Pleasure Theory, and how can it help us to better understand human sexuality?
• Are lesbians as willing to accept offers of casual sex as gay men?

For further reading on this subject, check out:

Clark, R. D., & Hatfield, E. (1989). Gender differences in receptivity to sexual offers. Journal of Psychology & Human Sexuality, 2(1), 39-55.

Conley, T. D. (2011). Perceived proposer personality characteristics and gender differences in acceptance of casual sex offers. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 100(2), 309.

Matsick, J. L., Kruk, M., Conley, T. D., Moors, A. C., & Ziegler, A. (2021). Gender Similarities and Differences in Casual Sex Acceptance Among Lesbian Women and Gay Men. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 50(3), 1151-1166.

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