The Sexiest Survey of the Year

By Hilde van den Berg & Marijn Thijs

Foreplay

Sex is and remains a hot topic. This year too, students were eager to fill in the Sex Survey. With a response rate of 356 out of 581 (the number of students according to the UCR Educational Report in 2014), a whopping 61% of students filled in this year’s survey. 356 of you were kind enough to share your best and worst times with us, and to give us an insight into the mating habits (or lack thereof) of the average UCR student. Of course there was something in it for you, too, because we proudly present you this year’s results!

Most participants lived in Roggeveen (109, 30.6%) and Bagijnhof (105, 29.5%). Being two of the biggest campus locations, this does not come as a surprise. Even Zusterstraat and Zuidsingel were still represented, albeit with the smallest number of participants. In fact, as only one person from Zusterstraat participated, we cannot analyze them separately without running into some statistical reliability and validity problems.

So, how about the virgin count? Last year, 106 students (25%) said they were virgins. This year, the number is relatively equal. 103 students were virgins when they filled in the survey (in the meantime, who knows what happened). However, the ratio of virgins tonon virgins has changed slightly in the past year. Now, these 103 students make up 28% of the participants. Still, the other 253 students have done the deed and can satisfy everyone’s curiosity.

But who exactly are these 356 students? It may not be surprising that the sample consists of 65.7% of females (234), and for 32.9% of males (117). This was approximately the same last year, and seems to reflect the overall UCR community quite well. The remaining 1.4% (5 people) filled in other, although two have to be excluded due to inappropriate and not-so-serious answers. The remaining answers were very helpful to understand the presence of other gender on campus, however, so we would like to thank everyone who felt comfortable enough to share their gender with us.

When it comes to virginity, 78 (33%) of the girls said to be virgin, whereas only 22 (19%) of the guys answered that. Now that we know who our participants are, who are they into? Unsurprisingly, the majority of the students identifies as straight (267, 75%). The second most common sexuality on campus is bisexuality (60, 16.9%), followed by homosexuality (19, 5.3%). The remaining 2.81% (10 students) filled in other. This year, “other” was a category with a lot of variation. While it was not possible to specify what exactly you meant by “other” last year, that option was added this time. The most popular responses were asexual (or other sexuality on that spectrum) and pansexual. Now, perhaps you want to know how the sexualities are distributed across gender. Similarly to last year, 51 of the 60 bisexuals are female, and the same goes for the category “other” (9 out of 10). Most gay students, on the other hand, were male (15 out of 19). In total, 81% of guys filled in “straight”, compared to 72% of girls.

Sex Ed

If you’re still planning on having sex at UCR, it may be good to know how safe it is around here. If you filled in the survey, you will have noticed that we asked you about your protection habits. Because there are many different types of protection, we divided them up into two categories: protection to prevent pregnancy, and to prevent sexually transmitted diseases. Of course there is some overlap there, because condoms are useful for both. However, we were interested in the intention behind the use. Of the girls, 60% said to always use protection to prevent pregnancy (such as contraception pills). The second majority was 24% of girls who answered “not applicable”. We can only speculate why, but it is reasonable to assume that at least some are virgins who have never used birth control. The figures shift when we ask girls about protection against STDs. Here, only 19% said that they always use protection, though another 16% claims they use it “most of the time”. An explanation for this, however, can be that 31% filled in “not applicable”. This rise in numbers could stem from the fact that some virgins might use birth control such as contraception pills, but have no need for protection from STDs just yet because they are virgins. Still, the results are worrying. A quarter of the female participants reported to “never” or “rarely” use protection to prevent STDs.

So, are the guys doing any better? 45% said to always use protection against pregnancy. In the case of guys, this will mostly come down to the use of condoms in order to prevent it. Add in the additional “most of the time”, and the percentage goes up to 57%. This does not seem ideal. Then again, 23% filled in “not applicable”, suggesting that they are either virgins or their partner does not possess the equipment that is needed to conceive. However, do they worry about STDs? It seems not, because only 33% of guys use protection to prevent STDs. Even by adding “most of the time”, it adds up to 44%. A quarter of guys “never” or “rarely” use protection (presumably condoms) to prevent STDs, and most of the remaining guys answered “not applicable”. We hope this means they are virgins, because we would like to clarify that STDs still apply to everyone who has sex, ever.

We also asked some more specific questions for the girls in relation to the prevention of pregnancy, especially in relation to unsafe sex. It turned out that, in fact, a quarter of girls had used the morning-after pill. Only four girls did not know what the morning-after pill was, but we hope they have looked it up in the meantime. It also turns out that pregnancy scares are quite common, for whatever reason. Of course, this may not just be because of unsafe sex. Even with double protection, a delayed period can still be a normal occurrence. Still, 40% of girls were at one point worried that something might have gone wrong.

Despite this, the STD count seems relatively low (4% of girls, 5% of guys). However, at least 18% of girls and 31.6% percent of guys don’t know, because “they have never been tested”. Get tested! Don’t ask us “where”, do we have to google it for you?

The Bigger the Better?

The survey asked whether people really believed that bigger equals better when it comes down to the size of one’s boobs, butt or penis. People generally have stronger opinions about butts than about the other two, and are also more opinionated. In the cases of both boobs and penis size, 40% of respondents claimed to not care what size they are, while this was only 30% for butts. Generally however, the answer to the question posed above is quite simply ‘no’. 17% of respondents (54) found boobs bigger when they are better, 26% liked a bigger penis over a smaller one, and 30% liked a bigger/better butt over a smaller/worse? one. This means that about 35% to 45% of respondents definitely don’t believe the ‘bigger the better’ myth to be true in any case.

Beating the meat or doing the deed?

It’s now time to look at the frequencies. Which campus location has most sex? Where do the students who pleasure themselves most reside? And where do the most avid porn-watchers live? To determine this, the answers ‘daily’ and ‘multiple times a week’ were pooled and compared. Only the bigger campus locations were considered in this comparison due to the sample size being too low in smaller campus locations. Generally, the residents of Bachtensteene have most sex, as 36.6% does the deed more than once a week, followed by Koestraat (32.2%), Bagijnhof (26.7%) and Roggeveen (21.1%). Roggeveen is generally the least sexually active campus – the highest percentage of virgins lives there and there are relatively little active viewers of pornography (21.1%), for example.

Koestraat seems to be the most sexually active campus location: a whopping 47.1% of residents admitted to masturbating more than once a week. Completely incidentally (of course), the students living in the southern part of Middelburg also watch most porn (29.8% more than once a week). Inhabitants of Bachtensteene masturbate the least (34.1%), but that might be correlated to the fact that they have more helping hands available to them. Roggeveen (40.4%) and Bagijnhof (41.0%) seem to be rather average in this respect compared to the other locations.

Percentage of people answering ‘daily’ or ‘multiple times a week’

That actual behavior in the bedroom is often not similar to the desired behavior is one that seems highly logical. Generally, only 6% of the student population who filled in the survey has sex on a daily basis. The majority of respondents replied either ‘never’ (28%) or ‘multiple times a week’ (27%). However, when comparing these numbers to the responses to the question ‘how often would you like to have sex?’ the distributions drastically change. Almost everyone indicates they would like the amount of times to increase, as 22% indicates they want to have sex daily and a massive 55% multiple times a week. This is by far the most popular response. 15% settles for an average of ‘once a week’, and 3% is happy not to bother will sex at all.

Your Behavior in Bed

There can be many traits to describe one’s behavior in the bedroom, and a few of these aspects were questioned in the survey. To the question ‘do you have sex with the lights on or the lights off?’, only 118 people (40%) indicate a preference. The distribution between these 118 is a fairly equal split between team ‘on’ and team ‘off’. A conclusion to derive from this figure is that getting some in general is more important than whether the lights are on or off. Furthermore, respondents generally feel like sex and drugs don’t go together. 28% of respondents believe alcohol and/or drugs are ‘performance enhancing’, whereas 39% clearly isn’t in favor of the effect of drugs on your conduct in bed. The remaining third of the respondents don’t know. On the other hand, some people really go hardcore; 13% of respondents share that they have had sex but didn’t remember it the day after. Don’t do drugs kids!

The survey also incorporated kinks and kinkiness into the research. UCR students generally hide hidden kinks less from their partner than from their friends (3% only from partner, 21% only from friends). Simultaneously, 22% also keeps their kink completely for themselves. The distribution of kinkiness is your standard Bell Curve: about 15% admits they are not at all kinky, and 17% seems to think of themselves as ‘kinky’, or the most exciting option ‘very kinky’. 19% of UCR students also confess to having used sex as a means to an end. There is barely any difference between genders in this respect.

The Deeper Questions

A new aspect considered in the survey is some moral questions. We asked about whether you felt that your sexual preferences and behavior were influenced by your culture and (religious) beliefs, whether you could have sex without love or love without sex, and what your opinions about open relationships are. From the 325 people who got this far into the survey, 222 believed that beliefs and culture had an effect on their sex life. As another interesting remark it is possible to see that males value sex a little bit more than females do by looking at the responses to the love-sex and sex-love questions. Generally, the responses are highly similar, with about 75% believing you can have sex without love and love without sex without any major problems. The gender balance is a little bit skewed though; 79% of males believe you can have sex without love (as opposed to 73% for females) and 31% believes you really need to consummate your love to make a relationship work (as opposed to 24% for females). Lastly, it also becomes clear that UCR is a liberal community even when it comes to sex: 14.5% (47 respondents) have been in an open relationship, and even more would consider being in one (40%, 130 respondents).

But, how easy do people think it is to find any kind of relationship at UCR? Out of curiosity, we decided to differentiate between sexual and romantic relationships. In terms of finding sexual partners, 31% of students (102) thought that it is easier for straight students to find sexual partners at UCR. A pretty close second, however, are the bisexual students. 23% of survey participants (76) thought that they are the ones who most easily find sex partners. Another 22% didn’t know. Interestingly enough, the figures change quite dramatically when we start talking about romantic relationships. In this case, 39% of students (130) thought that it is easier for straight students to find a romantic partner at UCR. After that, people are divided between “I don’t know” and “all equally”, respectively scoring 26.7% (88) and 22.5% (74). Apparently, people think that bisexuals have more difficulties finding a romantic partner. Only 6.99% (23) was convinced that they have it easier, and this is quite the dramatic drop. Unfortunately, did not ask people to provide their reasoning. Therefore, we cannot tell what brought on this change in figures. If you have any ideas, please let us know!

Confessionals

Worst part about sex

1. Cleaning up afterwards / the messiness and stickiness
2. When a guy can’t get an erection
3. A lot of condom-related issues
4. Sweatiness
5. Clumsiness/awkwardness
6. Not being able to get your partner off
7. When it ends
8. The expectation of actually having sex
9. If someone does not make you feel comfortable
10. The risks that come along with having sex

Strangest Locations

1. Behind/on the bar in Elliott downstairs
2. Bachtensteene rooftop
3. In the men’s bathroom in Elliott
4. Against one of the washing machines in the K2 laundry room
5. Silent Study Lounge in Franklin
6. School toilet
7. In the Elliott board room
8. Under one of the staircases in Roggeveen
9. In the Maquettezaal
10. In the Elliott study lounge

‘Worst stories’ about your sex-life

1. I was getting a blowjob and all of a sudden my partner sneezed and spewed snot all over my crotch
2. I was allergic to my ex boyfriend’s sperm. I almost fainted from pain
3. My boyfriend and me were drunk and I was on my period, we had sex only finding out afterwards my tampon was still in
4. After fiddling with a condom for about 50 minutes, there was about 30 seconds of sex left
5. Had unexpected periods during sex
6. Finding out he was a teacher at my school afterwards
7. Falling asleep halfway through
8. We got a note from the neighbors asking if we could keep it down because everyone could hear us
9. In my first time with a guy I really really liked, I was unable to get him off
10. I have broken a bed before

The Climax

We have reached the climax of this article. We hope you are just as excited about this survey as we are, and we thank all of you for collaborating. We have tried our best to add as much information about your responses as possible, but we haven’t covered everything. If you want to know more about any particular question, please send an email to [email protected].

Marijn Thijs, Class of 2016, is an Economics, Linguistics and History major from Maartensdijk, the Netherlands.

Hilde van den Berg, Class of 2016, is a Psychology and Law major from Doetinchem, the Netherlands.