Study Says Sending Nudes Might Stave Off Sexual Boredom
What if nudes could keep our partners attracted to us for the long haul?
There’s no worse feeling than watching someone slowly fall out of love with you. A close second is the nightmare of waking up every day and wondering where your attraction for your partner went.
Our biology underscores the fact that our desire for our partners tends to wane.
After a while with the same partner, sometimes getting aroused feels like we’re Sisyphus trying to push a giant rock up a hill with our bare hands. Everything feels heavier than it used to. Your energy is lacking. The spark doesn’t come as quickly as it once did.
Most of has have had this experience.
Two Types of Lovers
I’ve found that there are two ways people respond to this phenomenon. There are the people who pretend it’s a biological necessity, that biology equals destiny, and that it’s guaranteed to happen because we’re predisposed to lose that magic spark in our partners. There are the people who close their eyes, quietly but calmly bury their heads in the sand, and pretend that such a thing could never happen — especially not to them.
Even worse, many in the “we’re guaranteed to get bored with our partner” crowd like to pretend that absolutely nobody can have a lasting attraction for their partner; otherwise, they’re lying.
And many in the “you should never get bored with your partner” crowd like to blame their partner or the relationship when biology takes its course and the full flames of passion tamper down to slow, smoldering embers.
I believe that both or neither of these things can be true.
Sometimes, we can harbor deep, rich, unwavering attraction for our partners over many years (I know from experience). Other times, a diminished attraction for our partners can signal problems with the relationship itself or the match.
And then there are relationships where the passion has slowed, but it just needs the right kick in the pants to get it back into action.
It’s wise not to pretend that we have no control over someone’s attraction to us and our attraction to them.
Attraction Can Be Nurtured
I recently wrote an article about how scientific studies have linked several traits with women initiating sex more. As it turns out, there’s an ensemble of things that goes into sexual attraction beyond how our partner looks — what’s often essential is how our partner makes us feel.
Having a sense of humor, broad shoulders, motivation, intelligence, focus, and determination were linked with women initiating more sex. Some of these things increase the likelihood she’ll have an orgasm, too, which makes sense — women are more likely to initiate sex if they think it’s going to be good.
Things like sharing in household duties have also been linked to couples' greater sexual frequency and satisfaction.
Nudes and the Great Negation of Boredom
A new study called A Preliminary Study on Up-regulation of Sexual Desire for a Long-term Partner explored whether simply seeing sexual imagery of our partners could kickstart our attraction to them.
The small study asked participants to appraise their partners and their sex lives, then view sexually-charged imagery of their partners. Then participants were asked to rate their sexual desire, infatuation, attachment, and relationship satisfaction.
It should come as no surprise that the study found that people had a higher degree of infatuation and desire for their partners after viewing sexual images of their partners.
Note: there was no evidence that any of these strategies, appraising the relationship or checking out nudes, had an impact on relationship satisfaction or attachment. It was just the sexual desire that was incited in the participants.
While at a first glance, this study seems like it’s stating the obvious — that checking out sexual content featuring our partners makes us feel aroused — how often do we put it into practice? And what are the ramifications of this idea when we combine it with the aforementioned studies that found that certain traits made women more likely to initiate sexual encounters?
A Shift in Thinking
I think part of the reason sex declines in relationships is that we stop prioritizing it — we stop consciously choosing it. We instead shift to what’s called a “bond-maintenance” orientation and away from a “competitive” orientation.
Competitive orientation happens when we first meet someone, and we feel like we have to compete for their time, attention, and attraction. This includes the fun and uncertainty of first dates in your best outfit, along with the anticipation of seeing your new partner again after a long week, so you can just bathe in their presence.
Bond maintenance happens when we settle down and begin to try to maintain our relationship. This comes with children, household chores, navigating career paths, the whole nine yards. This includes driving a minivan, telling dad jokes, and planning for retirement.
Each of these relationship orientations has sets of behaviors that come along with them. It’s likely that as we transition from a competitive orientation to a bond-maintenance orientation, we engage in different behaviors. Oftentimes, these behaviors treat sex as an afterthought.
But with a bit of conscious effort, we can sometimes rekindle the spark by refocusing our relationship, away from the drudgery of the mundane and the day-to-day, and towards something much more erotic, sexual, and something that allows us to express (and indulge in) our sexual desire.