Cultural Variations in the Sexual Marketplace: Gender Equality Correlates With More Sexual Activity

Abstract

Sexual economics theory assumes that heterosexual communities can be analyzed as marketplaces in which men offer women resources such as love, respect, money, and commitment in exchange for sex. In response to economic, political, and other disadvantages, women collectively restrict their sexuality to maintain a low supply relative to male demand, thereby ensuring a high price. Hence, we tested the hypothesis that sexual norms and practices would be more restrictive in countries marked by gender inequality than in countries where the genders were more equal. An international online sex survey (N>317,000) yielded four measures of sexual activity, and 37 nations' means on all four measures were correlated with independent (World Economic Forum) ratings of gender equality. Consistent with predictions, relatively high gender equality was associated with more casual sex, more sex partners per capita, younger ages for first sex, and greater tolerance/approval of premarital sex.

Who punishes promiscuous women? Both women and men are prejudiced towards sexually-accessible women, but only women inflict costly punishment

“…A key implication of these findings is the need to recognise the foundational role of the local ecology and circumstances for whether female control or male control is more dominant or whether they are equivalent for the actual shaping of a woman's sexual behaviour at a given point in time. This is not a new observation, and speaks to a wider finding that ecological factors shape sexual suppression (Price et al, 2014;Baumeister & Mendoza, 2011;Schacht & Bell, 2016). Blake et al (2018b,a) recently highlighted how aspects of the local mating ecology can shape both men and women's endorsement of female sexual suppression.…”

“…There is some evidence that sexual suppression is moderated via contextual factors, such as local levels of gender equality (Baumeister & Mendoza, 2011) and women's economic reliance on men (Price et al, 2014;Stanik & Ellsworth, 2010). In a recent paper, Blake et al (2018b) found plasticity in sexual suppression, such that support of the Islamic veil is higher among men, as well as women with a higher number of sons relative to daughters.…”

The Road to Psychopathology: Neoliberalism and the Human Mind

“…However, this has less to do with the cost of pregnancy or the purportedly lower benefit (pleasure) for women, and more to do with the greater need for material benefits among women living in societies with high gender inequality. In countries with greater gender equality, the benefit of using sex for material ends is relatively less—economic security can be attained through other means—and sexuality is less suppressed (Baumeister & Mendoza, ). As Ghodsee () observes, “sexual economics theorists basically embrace a long‐standing socialist critique of capitalism: that it commodifies all human interactions and reduces women to chattel” (p. 115).…”

Correcting Some Misrepresentations About Gender and Sexual Economics Theory

“…Indeed, we ourselves have used SET to point out how men benefit from greater gender equality (Baumeister & Mendoza, 2011). We do not think of SET as a political statement, though, and object to Rudman and Fetterolf's attempts to politicize it.…”