<< Marital Intercourse and Age >>

Marital intercourse is the one sort of sexual activity which involves practically 100 per cent of the eligible males in the population. There are exceedingly few who marry and then fail to have any intercourse with their wives. Exceptions occur only among those who never live with their spouses after marriage, among those very few who are physically incapable of even attempting intercourse, among a few of those who are primarily homosexual and whose wives may be similarly homosexual, and among the still fewer males who are so inhibited by religious, esthetic, or other philosophies that they are incapable of performance or deliberately choose to avoid coitus even with their wives. Under forty years of age, these abstinent males are so few that they never account for more than a fraction of 1 per cent of the married population. At later ages, there are a few more males who do not engage in marital intercourse: as many as 2 per cent in the late forties and as many as 6 per cent in the late fifties (Table 56). No other type of sexual activity is found in the histories of such a high proportion of an eligible population.

But although marital intercourse thus provides the chief source of outlet for married males, immediately from the time of onset of marriage, it falls considerably short of constituting the total outlet of those individuals. In the married population taken as a whole, it does not ordinarily provide more than about 85 per cent of the total sexual outlet (Table 56). The remaining orgasms of the married male are derived from masturbation, nocturnal emissions, petting and heterosexual coitus with partners other than wives, the homosexual, and, especially in some Western rural areas, from intercourse with other animals. There is no pre-marital sexual activity which may not continue into marriage, although the frequencies of all these other activities are almost invariably reduced.

Table 137. Accumulative incidence data on total heterosexual intercourse for males
Age Total Intercourse: Accumulative Incidence Data
Total
Population
U. S.
Corrections		 Educ. Level
0-8		 Educ. Level
9-12		 Educ. Level
13+
Cases % with
Exper.		 Cases % with
Exper.		 Cases % with
Exper..		 Cases % with
Exper.
8 4148 0.0 663 0.0 668 0.0 2817 0.0
9 4148 0.0 663 0.0 668 0.0 2817 0.0
10 4148 0.1 663 0.2 668 0.0 2817 0.0
11 4148 0.8 663 1.4 668 0.7 2817 0.2
12 4148 4.4 663 6.8 668 4.0 2817 1.0
13 4147 12.9 662 15.0 668 14.2 2817 3.1
14 4143 25.6 659 28.2 667 29.2 2817 6.0
15 4115 36.8 653 42.7 645 40.6 2817 9.5
16 4047 49.2 636 57.2 595 53.4 2816 15.5
17 3939 60.1 599 67.6 526 65.6 2814 23.1
18 3769 68.3 575 78.1 456 72.6 2738 30.9
19 3516 73.9 545 82.4 397 78.3 2574 38.3
20 3206 77.1 517 86.1 350 80.3 2339 45.7
21 2832 80.5 493 88.4 306 83.7 2033 50.9
22 2430 83.9 474 91.4 284 86.3 1672 58.3
23 2114 86.5 458 92.6 259 89.2 1397 63.0
24 1823 88.6 438 95.0 233 90.1 1152 68.8
25 1637 90.7 418 95.7 217 91.7 1002 75.0
26 1494 91.8 407 96.6 203 91.6 884 80.1
27 1359 93.6 393 97.5 192 93.8 774 82.6
28 1253 94.2 379 97.6 175 94.3 699 85.1
29 1144 94.7 355 97.5 155 94.8 634 87.1
30 1050 95.2 339 97.9 138 94.2 573 89.5
31 973 95.9 319 98.1 125 95.2 529 90.9
32 915 96.0 307 98.7 116 94.8 492 91.3
33 856 95.9 295 98.6 113 94.7 448 91.1
34 804 96.5 287 99.0 105 95.2 412 92.5
35 747 97.4 273 99.3 92 95.7 382 93.2
36 703 97.9 260 99.6 87 96.6 356 93.8
37 641 98.5 242 99.6 76 98.7 323 93.5
38 611 98.6 234 99.6 70 98.6 307 94.1
39 556 98.6 212 99.5 64 98.4 280 95.4
40 509 98.8 194 99.5 58 98.3 257 96.1
41 474 99.3 183 99.5 53 100.0 238 96.2
42 445 99.2 174 99.4 50 100.0 221 95.9
43 399 99.1 159 99.4    192 95.3
44 369 99.1 146 99.3    177 95.5
45 340 99.0 135 99.3    161 95.0
“Educ. level 0-8” are the males who never go beyond grade school.
“Educ. level 9-12” are the males who enter high school but never go beyond.
“Educ. level 13+” are the males who will ultimately go to college.

Covering the life span, including pre-marital, marital, extra-marital,
and post-marital coitus with companions and with prostitutes.
In three educational levels, and in the total population corrected for the U. S. Census of 1940.

Figures 149-150. All intercourse: accumulative incidence,
                                 in total U. S. population and in three educational levels 
             Vs. masturbation (M), premarital intercourse (p-m I), and intercourse with prostitutes (Pr)

Showing percent of total population that has ever experienced in any kind of intercourse
by each of the indicated ages.
All data based on total population, irrespective of marital status,
and corrected for the U. S. Census distribution.


Marital intercourse is the one activity which is least affected by any of the social factors except marital status itself. Marital intercourse, the most extensive of all sexual activities of the human male, thus furnishes some insight into his sexual capacities. But more remarkable than the variation which occurs in marital intercourse is the fact that so much of it is stereotyped and restricted to the age-old patterns which are an established part of the mores. The variety that is recorded does no more than allow the scientist to glimpse the extent of the variation that might occur in the human animal’s sexual behavior. The data given here are based on males who are living with either legal or common-law wives.

Table 94f. Maximum Frequency of Marital Coitus
Ever, in Any Single Week. For females
Maximum
Frequency
in Any Week		 Total
Sample		 Educational Level
0-8 9-12 13-1617 +
% Cumul.
%		 Percent of females
1 1100 2 11 1
2 299 4 22 3
3 797 9 76 7
4 1290 14 1311 11
5 1378 15 1314 11
6 765 4 76 7
7 2359 32 2522 21
8 536 1 46 6
9 331  2 3 4
10 928 6 89 10
11 —19  — — —
12 319 1 34 3
13 —15     —
14 515 8 55 4
15 211 1 22 4
16 18  — 1 1
17 —8    — 
18 18  1 1 1
19  7     
20 37 2 23 4
21 13  2 1 1
22 —2    — 
23 —2  — — 
24 —2    — 
25 12  1 1 —
26  2     
27 —2  —   
28 —2    ——
29 + 11 1 21 1
Number of
cases		 237296 648 1026601

In our sample of American females, the incidences and frequencies of marital coitus had reached their maxima in the first year or two after marriage. From that point, they had steadily dropped into minimum frequencies in the oldest age groups. There is no other type of sexual activity among females which shows such a steady decline with advancing age.

Unlike any other type of sexual activity, the accumulative incidence of marital coitus had nearly reached its maximum, which was close to one hundred per cent, immediately after marriage. But neither the accumulative nor active incidences had quite reached a hundred per cent, for there were a few ( an exceeding few) of the married couples who had delayed their first coitus for some months or a year or more after marriage, and there were a few (an exceeding few) who had not had coitus at all after marriage. Some of the females in the sample had not actually lived with their husbands, and some of them were physically handicapped and incapable of having coitus. A few had married homosexual males as a matter of social convenience, and they were among the very few who had completely abstained from coitus in marriage.

The active incidence of marital coitus had included more than 99 per cent of all the married females in the younger age groups. After thirty years of age, the figure began to drop. Between thirty-one and thirty-five years of age, 98 per cent of the married females were still having coitus, but after age fifty-five, only 80 per cent of the sample were having coitus in their marriages. Our male sample showed a similar decline in active incidences in the older age groups, but the decline recorded by the females was a bit steeper than that recorded by the males. At fifty years of age, for instance, 97 per cent of the males reported that they were still having coitus, while only 93 per cent of the females reported such experience. By sixty years of age the record included 94 per cent of the males in contrast to 80 per cent of the females. These differences may be due to differences in the composition of the samples, or to the usual discrepancies in the ages of the married partners, or to differences in the way in which the males and females had reported coitus which occurred at very low frequencies.
A material drop in the percentage having marital coitus in the later age groups was also reported by Terman 1938:270 (98 per cent in the twenties, 65 per cent by age 60).

Table 56. Marital intercourse and age
Age
Group		 Cases Marital intercourse:
Sample Population		 Marital intercourse:
U. S. Population
Total population Active Population Total
population		 Active Population
Mean
Frequency		 Me-
dian
Freq.		 % of
Total
Outlet		 Incid.
%		 Mean
Frequency		 Me-
dian
Freq.		 % of
Total
Outlet		 Mean
Freq.		 % of
Total
Outlet		 Incid.
%		 Mean
Freq.		 % of
Total
Outlet
Married Males
16-20 272 3.75 ± 0.24 2.56 81.36 100.0 3.75 ± 0.24 2.56 84.61 ± 1.23 3.92 81.41 100.0 3.92 85.2
21-25 751 3.16 ± 0.12 2.27 81.80 99.6 3.17 ± 0.12 2.28 85.26 ± 0.75 3.34 81.29 99.7 3.35 85.9
26-30 737 2.69 ± 0.10 1.98 83.30 99.7 2.70 ± 0.10 1.98 85.50 ± 0.71 2.89 83.17 99.9 2.89 86.4
31-35 569 2.23 ± 0.10 1.75 82.57 99.6 2.24 ± 0.10 1.76 85.07 ± 0.85 2.45 85.48 99.9 2.46 87.4
36-40 390 1.97 ± 0.11 1.58 81.18 99.2 1.99 ± 0.11 1.59 85.84 ± 1.01 2.05 86.35 99.5 2.22 87.0
41^5 272 1.62 ± 0.10 1.26 82.98 98.9 1.64 ± 0.10 1.28 85.90 ± 1.26 1.74 88.27 98.6 1.77 88.8
46-50 175 1.43 ± 0.14 0.86 80.16 97.1 1.47 ± 0.14 0.88 83.69 ± 1.88 1.80 87.79 98.1 1.83 87.3
51-55 109 1.19 ± 0.16 0.73 77.42 97.2 1.22 ± 0.16 0.76 83.07 ± 2.58 1.33 87.21 97.0 1.38 88.0
56-60 67 0.83 ± 0.11 0.62 78.29 94.0 0.89 ± 0.11 0.68 81.10 ± 3.95 .... ..... .... .... ....
56-60 77 0.14 ± 0.05 0.00 12.05 22.1 0.65 ± 0.16 0.50 40.94 ± 9.25 .... .... .... .... ....
In this, and in the succeeding charts in this and the following chapter, means and medians represent average frequencies per week.
     “% of Total Outlet” in the total population shows what portion of the total number of orgasms is derived from masturbation in the total population.
A total of such figures for all the possible sources of outlet equals 100%, which is the total outlet of the group.
     “% of Total Outlet” for the active population represents the mean of the figures showing the percentage of the total outlet
which is derived from this source by each individual who has any masturbation in his history, in that particular age period.
The percents for the several possible outlets do not total 100% because different individuals are involved in the populations utilizing each type of outlet.

U. S. population figures are corrections of the raw data for a population whose age, marital status, and educational level
are the same as those shown in the U. S. Census for 1940.

Figures 44-49. Relation of age to marital intercourse


Between 16 and 40 years of age, practically all of the males (more than 99%) who are married find some outlet in marital intercourse (Table 56, Figures 44-49). From 45 on, there are a few males who discontinue such intercourse even though they remain wedded and live with their wives. By 60 years of age about 6 per cent of the married males are no longer active. Our limited series of older histories shows 83 per cent of the males having intercourse with their wives at ages 60-65, and 70 per cent having it between 66 and 70. We have so few histories of still older married males that we cannot make a further statement.

In the population as a whole, and in all of its subdivisions, the highest frequencies of marital intercourse occur in the youngest age groups. In all the age groups between 16 and 30, there are individuals who have intercourse with frequencies as high as 25 or more per week (Table 49). It is particularly instructive to compare average frequencies in marital intercourse for successive age groups (Table 56, Figures 44-49).

Between 16 and 20, the boy who is married has a higher rate of total sexual outlet (4.8 per week) than the males of any other group, and most of that outlet (over 85%) is derived from his marital intercourse. Males who are married between 16 and 20 start with frequencies which average 3.9 for the population as a whole (Table 56), and many individuals at that age have intercourse on an average of 5, 7, 10 or more times per week. There is considerable individual variation, and the 15 per cent of the group who are capable of multiple orgasm (Table 48, Figure 36) may regularly secure 14, 21, or more climaces per week from intercourse with their wives. The frequencies of the intercourse in this teen-age group average near 4 (3.9) per week. Such high frequencies are not found in older groups. 

At the high school level the beginning frequencies of marital intercourse may be as high as 4.1 per week. From there on, the mean frequencies drop in each successive five-year period. Frequencies drop steadily from the teens to about 2.9 at age 30, to 1.8 at age 50, and to 0.9 at age 60. Among all the calculations in the present study, there is none which falls along straighter lines. The decline is at an astonishingly constant rate, from the youngest to the oldest ages. There the range of variation becomes narrower; and by 50 years of age the maximum average rate for any individual is 14 per week. By 60 years of age, the maximum has cut down to 3 per week and the average frequency is about once (0.9) per week.

The average (active median) frequencies of marital coitus in the sample of American females had begun at nearly three (2.8) per week for the females who were married in their late teens. They had dropped to 2.2 per week by thirty years of age, to 1.5 per week by forty years of age, to 1.0 per week by fifty years of age, and to once in about twelve days (0.6 per week) by age sixty. These figures are closely comparable to the frequencies indicated by the males in the sample. We have already noted that studies of paired spouses indicate that females estimate the frequencies of their marital coitus a bit higher than males estimate them, evidently because some females object to the frequencies of coitus and therefore overestimate the amount they are actually having. Males, on the other hand, often wish that they were having coitus more frequently, and consequently may underestimate the amount they actually have.
The best data on coital rates in marriage in the previously published studies are in Terman 1938:270-271, who reports a median frequency of 7.2 per month under age 25, 4.1 per month at ages 35 to 44, and 1.2 per month after age 55. Dickinson and Beam 1931:58, and Bernard 1935:433, fail to find any consistent variation in frequency correlated with age, apparently because they had not systematically gathered the data. In nearly all the other studies, the frequency data are calculated for total samples, without respect to age, e.g.: Schbankov acc. Weissenberg 1924a: 12 (6 to 8 times per month, for 42 Russian wives). Hamilton 1929:374 (recalculates 1.7 per week as a median for 84 cases). Davis 1929:21 (I to 2 per week for 1000 cases). Gurewitsch and Grosser 1929:539 (I to 3 per week, for 124 Russian women). Dickinson and Beam 1931:219 (nearly 2 per week, for 205 couples). Harvey 1932b:65, 70 (summarizes earlier studies, with a composite rate of 8 per month). Kopp 1933:94 (twice a week, median among 8671 females). McCance, et al. 1937: 598, 608 ( 1.2 per week, for 56 British wives, ages 20-47). Woodside 1950:134 (2 per week, for 44 cases). Slater and Woodside 1951:165 ( 2 per week, for 200 English couples). Havelock Ellis 1936(11,3) :532-536, in a comprehensive survey of historical and religious pronouncements on appropriate frequencies of marital coitus, cites: Zoroaster (once in 9 days), Hindu authorities (3 to 6 times a month), Solon (3 times a month), the Koran (once a week), Talmud (once a day to once a week depending on occupation), Luther (twice a week).

Because there are some individuals who have coitus with frequencies which are much higher than the averages given above, the mean frequencies are higher than the median frequencies in all age groups. Because such a high proportion of all of the females were having coitus in each age period, the median and mean frequencies calculated for the total sample are essentially the same as those calculated for the active sample.

The day-by-day calendars which we have on some hundreds of cases of married females and males show a remarkable regularity in the occurrence of marital coitus. There are, of course, periods of illness, periods of menstruation or pregnancy, periods when the spouses are separated, and other interruptions in the regular sequence of coital rates. But, by and large, coitus in marriage occurs with a regularity which is not equaled by any other type of sexual activity in the female, although it may be matched by the masturbatory, coital, and sometimes homosexual activity of the male. This suggests that it is the male rather than the female partner who is chiefly responsible for the regularity of marital coitus.

On the other hand, the average male draws a nearly constant proportion of his total outlet throughout his life from marital intercourse. He gets from 85 to 89 per cent of his outlet from that source between 16 and 55, after which there is only a slight drop in the significance of marital intercourse. Since his rate has gone down while he continues to draw a constant portion of his total outlet from the intercourse, it is obvious that the decline in frequency of this activity must occur at precisely the same rate as the decline in the frequency of his total outlet..

Although biologic aging must be the main factor involved, it still is not clear how often the conditions of marriage itself are responsible for this decline in frequency of marital intercourse. Long-time marriage provides the maximum opportunity for repetition of a relatively uniform sort of experience. It is not surprising that there should be some loss of interest in the activity among the older males, even if there were no aging process to accelerate it.

It is significant to find that the married males who have the highest total outlets, most of which depend upon high frequencies of marital intercourse, are, for every social level, those who became adolescent first (Table 71, Figure 90). Married males who became adolescent as early as 10 or 11 average mean total outlets of 5 to 7 per week, if they are married during the age period 16 to 20, as against mean outlets of 3.3 per week for the married males who did not become adolescent until fifteen or later. It has already been pointed out (Chapter 9) that this indicates that the wife’s part in determining the frequency of marital intercourse is not as important as one might expect. The age at which the male became adolescent or, more strictly speaking, the general metabolic level which probably determines both the age of onset of adolescence and the intensity of a male’s sex drive, appears to be the prime factor in fixing the frequency of marital intercourse.

There seems to have been very little relation between the ages at which the females in the sample had turned adolescent and the incidences and frequencies of their marital coitus or the incidences and frequencies of their coitus to the point of orgasm. This might have been expected, considering the control which the male spouse exercises over the rates of coitus in marriage. Similarly, the proportion of the total outlet which was derived from the coitus did not show any consistent correlation with the ages at which the females in the sample had turned adolescent.

There are no significant differences between older and younger generations in the frequencies of their marital intercourse, in the same age periods.

Table 122. Marital intercourse and rural-urban background
Age
Group		Rural-
Urban
Group		 CasesMarital Intercourse: Rural, Urban
Total Population Active Population
Mean
Frequency		Me
dian
Freq.		%of
Total
Outlet		Incid.
%		Mean
Frequency		Me
dian
Freq.
Educational Level 0-8
21-25 Rural 128 3.03 ± 0.31 1.99 90.6 100.0 3.03 ± 0.31 1.99
 Urban 162 3.44 ± 0.28 2.38 76.3 98.1 3.51 ± 0.28 2.42
26-30 Rural 117 2.90 ± 0.36 1.83 88.5 100.0 2.90 ± 0.36 1.83
 Urban 148 2.86 ± 0.21 2.33 86.0 98.6 2.90 ± 0.21 2.35
31-35 Rural 93 2.39 ± 0.29 1.58 88.1 100.0 2.39 ± 0.29 1.58
 Urban 109 2.73 ± 0.25 2.18 91.9 100.0 2.73 ± 0.25 2.18
36-40 Rural 84 2.21 ± 0.28 1.54 91.4 100.0 2.21 ± 0.28 1.54
 Urban 75 2.23 ± 0.24 1.95 89.2 98.7 2.26 ± 0.24 1.98
Educational Level 13+
21-25 Rural 63 3.34 ± 0.47 2.65 84.6 100.0 3.34 ± 0.47 2.65
 Urban 428 3.07 ± 0.11 2.58 84.1 99.5 3.08 ± 0.11 2.59
26-30 Rural 86 2.49 ± 0.29 1.93 82.9 100.0 2.49 ± 0.29 1.93
 Urban 516 2.77 ± 0.10 2.23 83.1 99.2 2.79 ± 0.10 2.25
31-35 Rural 76 2.22 ± 0.24 1.85 82.2 100.0 2.22 ± 0.24 1.85
 Urban 402 2.38 ± 0.11 1.91 81.1 99.5 2.40 ± 0.11 1.92
36-40 Rural 50 1.77 ± 0.22 1.53 79.2 98.0 1.81 ± 0.22 1.56
 Urban 281 2.06 ± 0.12 1.66 76.6 98.9 2.09 ± 0.12 1.67

Contrary to previous suggestions (Pearl 1925), frequencies of marital intercourse prove to be slightly but consistently lower among rural males than they are among city-bred males (Table 122), if corrections are made for age and social level in making such comparisons. This is in accord with the observation (Chapter 12) that the rural male has fewer chances to make socio-sexual contacts of any sort, and is more inept in making sexual advances even to his wife after marriage. It is also possible that there is more religious restraint on sexual activity among rural groups.

It is significant to find that frequencies of marital intercourse are lower among religiously active Protestants and higher among inactive Protestants (Table 130). The differences may amount to as much as 20 or 30 per cent. There are not sufficient data on Catholic or Jewish marriages to warrant any statements for those groups. The data on the Protestant groups are, however, particularly interesting because the restraints which the church has placed upon pre-marital relations, upon extra-marital relations, and upon all other types of sexual activity outside of marital intercourse, are justified by the explanation that the whole of one’s emotional and overt sexual life should be developed around one lifelong partner in marriage. It would appear, however, that the effect of inhibitions on pre-marital sexual activity are carried over into inhibitions upon coitus with the married partner. Psychologically, this is quite what might have been expected.

As we have already shown, the accumulative incidences of masturbation, pre-marital petting, and pre-marital coitus were considerably affected by the female’s religious background. In general, these pre-marital activities had occurred among a larger number of the least devout Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish females, and among a smaller number of the more devout females. But after a female had become involved in one of these pre-marital activities, the frequencies of her activity, and of her response to orgasm, had been little if at all affected by her religious background.

Since coitus between wedded spouses is a form of sexual activity which the law and the church codes allow and, in many instances, encourage or impose as a duty, it is not surprising to find that the accumulative and active incidences of marital coitus were essentially the same among all of the groups of females in the sample, irrespective of their levels of religious devotion. Just as with the premarital activities, after the marital activities had started, the frequencies of activity and the frequencies of activity to the point of orgasm had not significantly differed in the various religious groups. There are only a few points in the younger age groups at which there seems to be some indication that the more devout groups were a bit slower in developing any frequency in their marital coitus. For most of the groups the degree of religious devotion had not determined the frequency of their responses to orgasm, i.e., the percentage of the copulations which had led to orgasm; but the more devout Catholic groups had been more restrained than the inactive Catholic groups.

Actually, since it is the male who has most to do with determining the rate of coitus in marriage, and since our data have shown that the more devout males do carry over their moral attitudes and keep the coital rates low in marriage, it is not surprising to find that the level of the male’s devotion affects the rates of the marital coitus while the female s level of devotion does not.

In contrast to the uniformity of the incidences and frequencies in the various religious groups, we do find a correlation between the female’s religious background and the percentage of the total outlet which she derives from her marital coitus. In 8 out of the 9 groups on which we have sufficient data to compare religiously devout and inactive groups, we find that the more devout females were deriving a somewhat higher percentage of their total sexual outlet from their marital coitus. The differences were rather marked—a matter of 12 to 14 per cent in some cases, and of 4 to 12 per cent in most cases. This means that the religiously inactive groups among the married females were reaching orgasm more often than the devout groups in such non-marital activities as masturbation and extra-marital coitus.

Beyond these several factors which affect the frequencies of marital intercourse, the restraint of the wife constantly lowers the frequencies in all segments of the population, but chiefly among better educated groups. A great many husbands wish their coitus were more frequent, and believe it would be if their wives were more interested. That this may be an expression of fact is peculiarly corroborated by the large number of wives who report that they consider their coital frequencies already too high and wish that their husbands did not desire intercourse so often. A very few wives wish for more frequent coitus; only a very few husbands wish their wives were not so desirous.

These differences in interest inevitably cause difficulties in marital adjustment, and there is no sexual factor which causes more difficulty at upper social levels. The situation depends upon basic differences in the sexual characteristics of males and females throughout the class Mammalia, and it should be realized that they do not arise in the perversities of the particular individuals who happen to be united in a particular marriage. If clinicians are to provide the maximum help in individual instances of marital maladjustment, it is fundamental that we learn as much as possible about the diverse origins of the sexual responses of males and females among higher animals in general, and among human males and females in particular.

The individual variation in the frequencies of marital coitus had been considerable. This had undoubtedly depended on differences in the interests and capacities of the individual females, but it had also depended on the great variation which exists in the interests and capacities of the male spouses.

The most common frequencies in the sample (the mode of the variation curve) had been close to the median frequencies. They lay between two and four times per week for the younger age groups, but had dropped to about once a week by age forty. In the younger groups, only a few individuals had had coitus less often than once in two weeks. The number of those who were having such low rates of contact had increased in the older age groups , and the percentages with such low rates had begun to dominate by the middle forties.

The maximum frequencies in all of the age groups had extended considerably beyond the median or modal values. Some 14 per cent of the married females in the sample had had marital coitus with frequencies of seven or more per week during their late teens. By thirty years of age it was only 5 per cent, and by forty years of age it was only 3 per cent who were having coitus with average frequencies of seven or more per week. However, in each age group, from the youngest to age forty, there were some individuals who were having coitus in their marriages on an average of four times a day, every day in the week. By fifty-five years of age there were only two individuals in the sample who were having coitus as frequently as seven or eight times per week, and none who were having it more frequently.
High frequencies in marital coitus are also noted in: Davis 1929:29-31. Hamilton 1929:374 (20 per cent with daily coitus in first year of marriage). McCance et al. 1937:598. Terman 1938:270. The supposed dangers of over-frequent coitus are luridly portrayed in some of the older literature. A loss of mental grip, backache, lassitude, giddiness, dimness of sight, noises in the ears, numbness of fingers, loss of memory, and paralysis are ascribed to frequent coital activity, as, for instance, in: Marinello 1563:5-6 (an early Italian medical book with remedies for ills caused by too frequent coitus in the female ). Pomeroy 1888:79-80 (“It is wise to abide by temperance and duty in the marital relation. . . . We may drink the nectar as we will . . . if we drink too deeply she [nature] adds water . . . then gall, and finally, it may be, deadly poison”). Stall 1897:95 (‘no man of average health . . . can exceed the bounds of once a week without . . . danger of having entered upon a life of excess both for himself and for his wife” ).

It must be emphasized that declines in the incidences and frequencies of marital coitus, and of coitus to the point of orgasm, do not provide any evidence that the female ages in her sexual capacities. We have previously pointed out, that in such solitary activities as masturbation and nocturnal dreams to orgasm, the female frequencies rise gradually to their maximum point and then stay more or less on a level until after fifty-five or sixty years of age. Since the female’s participation in masturbation is largely a matter of her own choosing, the frequencies of such an activity are probably a good measure of her sexual interests and intrinsic capacities. We have, on the other hand, pointed out that in such a socio-sexual activity as pre-marital petting, the frequencies of the female’s experience reach a peak at some early age and then do decline; but this pattern is certainly controlled by the male’s desires, and it is primarily his aging rather than the female’s loss of interest or capacity which is reflected in the decline.

In exactly the same way, the steady decline in the incidences and frequencies of marital coitus, from the younger to the older age groups, must be the product of aging processes in the male. There is little evidence of any aging in the sexual capacities of the female until late in her life.

One of the tragedies which appears in a number of the marriages originates in the fact that the male may be most desirous of sexual contact in his early years, while the responses of the female are still undeveloped and while she is still struggling to free herself from the acquired inhibitions which prevent her from participating freely in the marital activity. But over the years most females become less inhibited and develop an interest in sexual relations which they may then maintain until they are in their fifties or even sixties. But by then the responses of the average male may have dropped so considerably that his interest in coitus, and especially in coitus with a wife who has previously objected to the frequencies of his requests, may have sharply declined. Many of the husbands in the sample reported that early in their marriages they had wanted coitus more often than their wives had wanted it. Many of the younger married females reported that they would be satisfied with lower coital rates than their husbands wanted. On the other hand, in the later years of marriage, many of the females had expressed the wish that they could have coitus more frequently than their husbands were then desiring it. Most of the decline in the male’s interest may have represented physiologic aging; part of it may have been the product of a failure to work out effective relations in the earlier years of marriage; and part of it may have been a product of the fact that a number of the males—especially the better-educated males—were engaging in extra-marital coitus or other extramarital sexual activities in their forties and fifties at the expense of coitus with their wives.
The wife’s preference for lower rates of coitus early in marriage is also reported in Dayis 1929:74 (64 per cent of 968 marriages). The same preference in early marriage, and the wife’s desire for more coitus in the later years of marriage, are also reported in Terman 1938:272-273.

Table 130. Marital intercourse as related to religious background
Religious Group Cases Marital Intercourse and Religion
Total Population Active Population
Mean
Frequency		 Median
Freq.		% of
Total
Outlet		Incid.
%		Mean
Freq.		Median
Freq.
Educational Level 13 +

Age: 21-25

Protestant, active 91 2.80 ± 0.25 2.19 86.6 98.9 2.83 2.22
Protestant, inactive 280 3.19 ± 0.17 2.51 83.3 99.6 3.20 2.52
Jewish, inactive 86 3.34 ± 0.22 2.88 84.3 100.0 3.34 2.88

Age: 26-30

Protestant, active 123 2.15 ± 0.14 1.85 82.1 99.2 2.17 1.86
Protestant, inactive 346 2.80 ± 0.14 2.13 82.1 99.7 2.81 2.14
Jewish, inactive 109 2.92 ± 0.20 2.47 83.2 99.1 2.95 2.49

Age: 31-35

Protestant, active 109 1.84 ± 0.11 1.75 80.8 98.2 1.87 1.78
Protestant, inactive 270 2.43 ± 0.14 1.86 78.7 100.0 2.43 1.86
Jewish, inactive 84 2.54 ± 0.24 2.12 83.8 100.0 2.54 2.12

Age: 36-40

Protestant, active 73 1.58 ± 0.11 1.56 79.8 98.6 1.61 1.57
Protestant, inactive 187 2.07 ± 0.16 1.59 73.1 98.4 2.11 1.61
Jewish, inactive 62 2.28 ± 0.22 1.90 82.8 100.0 2.28 1.90

The percentage of the total outlet which the married male derives from intercourse with his spouse varies considerably with different social levels. For the lower level group it provides 80 per cent of the outlet during the early years of marriage, but an increasing proportion of the outlet as the marriage continues (Table 97). By 50 years of age the lower level male is deriving 90 per cent of his outlet from marital intercourse. On the other hand, males of the college level derive a larger proportion of their outlet (85%) from intercourse with their wives during the early years of marriage, but a smaller proportion of their outlet in later years. Not more than 62 per cent of the upper level male’s outlet is derived from marital intercourse by the age of 55. At no time in their lives do college-bred males depend on marital intercourse to the extent that lower level males do throughout most of their marriages.

These data will surprise most persons because there seems to have been very little comprehension that marital intercourse provided anything less than the total outlet for married males at all levels. Several scientific and sociologic investigations have been based on the assumption that a study of marital intercourse was the equivalent of studying the sexual lives of at least the married portion of the population. This accords, of course, with the emphasis placed in Anglo-American ethical systems on marital intercourse as the goal of all sexual development; although there are some cultures in which a history of sexuality would be primarily a history of non-marital sexual activities.

Something between 72 and 89 per cent of the total outlet of the married females in the sample had been derived from their marital coitus. In the late teens, 84 per cent of the outlet of these females had come from this coitus. The maximum figure, 89 per cent, had been reached between the ages of twenty-one and twenty-five, after which the percentage had steadily dropped. At sixty years of age, only 72 per cent of the total outlet of the married females was being derived from the coitus in marriage.

This decline in the significance of marital coitus had depended in part upon the considerable reduction in coital frequencies in the older age groups and its replacement by other outlets. Masturbation and extra-marital coitus had again become important sources of outlet for the married females in these later years. The decline had further depended upon the fact that only a smaller percentage of the females were reaching orgasm in the later years of their marriages.

There were surprisingly few differences between the incidences and frequencies of marital coitus among the females of the several educational levels represented in the sample. The widespread opinion that coitus is most frequent among the economically poorest segments of the population receives corroboration in only a very minor way in this sample which, however, inadequately represents the grade school group.

The active incidences of coital experience in marriage had been essentially the same in all of the educational levels.

But in almost every age group, and particularly in the younger age groups, fewer of the females of the lower educational levels had reached orgasm in their marital coitus (the active incidences). In the younger groups, as many as 10 per cent more of the females of the upper educational levels had experienced some orgasm in their coitus.

The differences, however, were not so marked after age thirty, where they amounted to something between 1 and 6 per cent. However, these data merely show the number of females who had ever reached orgasm in any five-year period. The percentages of the copulations which had led to orgasm are discussed in a later section of this chapter, where the data show that a distinctly higher proportion of the better educated females, in contrast to the grade school and high school females, had actually reached orgasm in a higher percentage of their marital coitus.

In the younger age groups, the active median frequencies of marital coitus had averaged a bit higher among the females of the grade school group in the sample; but the differences did not amount to more than one orgasm in two to five weeks, and they had more or less completely disappeared by the middle thirties.

The percentage of the total outlet which was drawn from marital coitus by the females of the various educational levels represented in the sample did not seem to have been consistently different in the earlier age groups. But after age twenty-five the females of the college and graduate groups seem to have derived a slightly smaller proportion of their total outlet from coitus. In the forties, for instance, the high school sample had derived something between 73 and 80 per cent of its outlet from marital coitus, while the graduate group had derived only 60 to 65 per cent of its outlet from that source. This so closely parallels the situation for the male that we are inclined to believe that these differences are significant. The decreasing dependence upon marital coitus in the older female is, however, not a product of her desire to substitute masturbation or extra-marital relations for her marital outlet, but of the fact that the older upper level male is no longer as interested in having coitus with such high frequencies, or has become dependent on extra-marital contacts and masturbation. The lower level male does not so often turn to these alternative outlets in his later years, and consequently the lower level female continues to find her chief outlet in coitus with her husband.

Table 11. Four-way breakdown, U. S. Census, 1940
Age
Group		 Age
Total		Rural-Urban Educational Level Marital Status
Non-
farm		Farm 0-8 9-12 13 + No
Rpt.		S M W&D
15-19 12.33 8.99 3.33 4.20 7.70 0.40 0.1 12.09 0.16 0.00
20-24 11.43 8.85 2.59 3.48 6.24 1.62 0.1 8.33 2.95 0.06
25-29 10.93 8.85 2.08 4.13 5.10 1.61 0.1 3.98 6.73 0.13
30-34 10.22 8.38 .1.81 4.58 4.04 1.51 0.1 2.10 7.83 0.20
35-39 9.51 7.81 1.71 5.15 3.02 1.22 0.1 1.41 7.71 0.27
40-44 8.93 7.29 1.65 5.30 2.48 1.01 0.1 1.11 7.36 0.32
45^9 8.59 6.89 1.69 5.59 1.99 0.85 0.1 0.95 7.10 0.38
50-54 7.71 6.11 1.62 5.37 1.53 0.69 0.1 0.85 6.24 0.50
55-59 6.24 4.80 1.43 4.50 1.13 0.50 0.1 0.67 4.12 0.54
60+ 14.11 10.67 3.44 10.91 1.90 0.98 0.3 1.41 9.44 2.94
Total 100.00 78.65 22.35 53.21 35.13 10.39 1.2 32.90 60.44 5.34

Weights to be used for correcting data on populations resulting from a 4-way successive breakdown on males
where race, age, and either the rural-urban background, or the educational level, or the marital status
are the only items involved in the analyses.

  
The general opinion that males become increasingly interested in extramarital relations as they grow older, thus proves to be true only of the upper level male. The explanation of these differences between upper and lower educational levels is not immediately available.

It is possible that the increased frequencies of extra-marital intercourse among older males of the upper level are based on a conclusion that the early restraints on their sexual lives were not justified, and on an interest in securing extra-marital experience before old age has interfered with their capacities to do so. It sometimes happens that the decrease in the frequency of marital intercourse at this upper level is due to an increasing dissatisfaction with the relations which are had with restrained upper level wives. There are some who will ascribe the decrease in marital intercourse to the preoccupation of the educated male with the professional or business affairs of his life; but this explanation does not account for the fact that he finds a third of his total sexual outlet through channels other than marital intercourse. Moreover, it is to be emphasized that 19 per cent of the total outlet of these older males is derived neither from their wives, nor from extra-marital intercourse, nor from homosexual relations, but from such solitary activities as masturbation and nocturnal emissions.

If we note that marital intercourse does not supply the whole of the outlet of married males, it is even more important to note that it does not supply even half of the outlet of the male population taken as a whole. Only 60 per cent of the white American males are married at any particular time (Table 11 extended into older age groups, and U. S. Census 1940). Calculating from the age distribution of the total population, and from the mean frequencies of total outlet in each age group (Table 44), it develops that there are, on an average, 231 orgasms per week per hundred males between adolescence and old age. Calculating the orgasms secured in marital intercourse in each age group (Table 56), and correcting for the incidence of married males in the total population (Table 11), there prove to be, on an average, 106 orgasms per week which are derived from coitus with spouses, per hundred males of the total population (single and married). This means that only 45.9 per cent of the total outlet of the total population is derived from marital intercourse.

Thus it will be seen that marital intercourse, although it is the most important single source of sexual outlet, does not provide even half of the total number of orgasms experienced by the males in our American population. Allowing for the socially and legally accepted 5 or 6 per cent of the outlet which is secured from nocturnal emissions (Table 97), it is to be concluded that approximately half of the sexual outlet of the total male population is being secured from sources which are socially disapproved and in large part illegal and punishable under the criminal codes. Marital intercourse, important as it is in the lives of most of the population, falls far short of constituting the whole of the sexual history of the American male.

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