Sexual experience and drinking among women in a U.S. national survey

Abstract

A 1981 national survey of 917 women provided rates of major sexual experiences and dysfunctions for the entire sample and across alcohol abstention/consumption categories. Most women drinkers (heavier drinkers most often) reported that drinking lessens sexual inhibition and helps them feel close to others; only 8% reported becoming less particular in sexual partner choice, 22% more sexually assertive, but over half (60%) had been targets of other drinkers' sexual aggression. On a sexual dysfunction index combining lifetime lack of sexual interest, lifetime lack or low frequency of orgasm with a partner, and vaginismus, moderate drinkers scored significantly lower than lighter and heavier drinkers. The heaviest drinking women had the highest rates of lifetime sexual disinterest and lack of orgasm with a partner. “Temporary abstainers” (who drank in the past 12 months but not the last 30 days) also had elevated sexual dysfunction rates, particularly those with substantial drinking histories. Several nontraditional sexual behaviors were correlated with heavier drinking, which was also related to morally liberal sexual attitudes. The study's findings may show the effects of a generalized moral value framework in which one large portion of the nation's population, especially females, is subject to pervasive proscriptions of behavior, including their drinking and sexuality, while others vary in the freedom they find to drink and be sexual. More suppressed traditional sexuality occurs more frequently with lighter drinking and abstention, as is also true of sexual dysfunction. At heavier drinking levels suppressed and dysfunctional sexuality and heavy drinking may be both cause and consequence in a vicious circle, sometimes escaped by temporary or lasting abstention.