Lecture 19 - Hook up culture Flashcards
What is hooking up and casual sex?
Hooking up is brief uncommitted sexual encounters among individuals who are not romantic partners or dating each other.
Hookups may include any sexual behaviour in an uncommitted context, from kissing to oral to intercourse.
“A sexual encounter between people who are not dating or in a relationship and where a more traditional romantic relationship is not an explicit condition”.
“Wehn a girl and a guy get together for a physical encounter and don’t necessarily expect anything further”.
What does hooking up entail sexually?
Hookups may include any sexual behaviour in a seemingly uncommitted context. Fielder and Carey reported 98% involved kissing.
Discuss the relationship between drugs and alcohol and hookup culture
Hookups are more common in drug and alcohol users. 61% of undergrads used alcohol with average of 3.3 drinks during most recent hookups.
Nearly 50% of hookups in one study participants admitted to being very or extrememly intoxicated.
Small interview study showed 64% of participants attributed hookup progression to alcohol.
Best predictor of hookups though was previously hooking up.
What is the sexual strategies theory
Men prefer as many mates as possible, including short-term sexual encounters that can potentially maximise reproductive output. Men will attempt to mate with a maximum number of partners, consent to sex more quickly than women and provide minimial resources to any but long-term partners, only conceding to a long-term relationship for the purpose of enhancing offspring vitality.
Relatively more men (62.5%) than women (45.4%) fall into the category of seeking short term mates in any way.
Women may seek casual sex in particulra contexts.
Gender differences in attitudes towards casual sex are some of the most pronouned differences of all sexual behaviours.
Mens ideal number of sex partners is much higher than females, in their lifetime they would like around 18, whereas women would like 5. And men are much more likely to have intercourse with a woman even after an hour (Buss & Schmitt, 1993).
Discuss sex differences in terms of regret
During hookups, most people report being happy and feeling good, aroused and excited.
After hookups, around 1/3 participants report some kind of bad affect (regret, disappointment, discomfort).
78% of women and 72% of men who has uncommitted sex reported a history of experiencing regret following such an encounter.
Type of regret is very different though, men had stronger feelings of being sorry because they felt they had taken advantage and used a person, whereas women had stronger feelings of regret because they felt used.
It is possible that regret and negative consqeuences result from individuals attempting to negotiate multiple desires.
Discuss emotional responses and mental health and hook up culture
Participants with more depressive symptoms and greater feelings of lonlieness who engaged in penetrative sex hookups subsequently reported a reduction in both depressive symptoms and feeling lonely (Owen et al., 2011).
Those partiticpants who reported less depressive symptoms who engaged in penetrative sex hookups subsequently reported an increase in both depressive symptoms and feeling of lonlieness.
Those who had the most regret after uncommitted sex also had more symptoms of depression than those with no regret.
Women’s but not mens degree of depressive symptoms increased with number of previous sex partners within the last year.
Both men and women who had ever engaged in an uncommitted sexual encounter had lower overall self-esteem scores compared to those without uncommitted sexual experiences but casual direction of the relationship between self-esteem and uncommited sex is yet unclear.
One study found the general lack of main effects of hooking up on well being was consistent with most prior longitudinal research on adolescents and young adults. Although casual sex may have certain features that many fear renders it potentially more harmful than romantic sex, engagement in this behaviour does not appear to uniformly affest well being.
What is a together woman
Agentic and experienced woman, who is sexually assertive and displays strong masculine desire discourse. These messages in media about being a together women may be increasing the likelihood of women taking part in hook up culture to feel in control and have strong sexual desire.
