The vast majority of women play a greater role in the care of children and housework than men. Especially during the pandemic, mothers were exhausted by the fact that children did not go to school and were educated at home.
Those who work in the field of sexuality are wondering how this situation affects women’s sexual lives and conduct a research. Particularly, in the study, it is desired to make a comparison between women who take full responsibility of the house alone and women who get the help of their partners in domestic tasks, and interesting results emerge.
Sexual reluctance is seen in more than 50% of women due to life fatigue.
Women use remarkable expressions when describing their motivation to have sex. For example, for them, this can be a way of feeling themselves in life and wanting to establish intimacy. According to psychologists, women can experience fluctuations in their sexual desires when their quality of life decreases. Of course, the willingness of the woman in sexual intercourse is as important as the willingness of the man. However, sometimes for various reasons, women may not want to have sex with their partner.
Experts state that it is difficult to understand women’s sexual desires in this context. So they propose two kinds of desire theories to understand them. One of these; sexual desire of one person for another; the other concerns individual desire, that is, personal feelings.
According to psychologists, these two desires are interrelated because one cannot exist without the other. Think of it this way; Individual desire may not mean much without the approval of another person. In other words, according to this theory, a person needs another person to feel sexy. Even if someone finds himself pleasant, someone else’s liking can lead to greater satisfaction. Thus, the individual can feel better.
What if women get tired more in daily life and if this is the reason for their lack of sexual interest; Does the equal responsibility of both partners encourage women to be more sexual?
In the study, which was conducted with 299 women aged 18-39 from Australia, they were asked questions about their sexual desires and partner relationships. For example, women are asked whether their partners or themselves organize social activities; who bears the burden of housework the most; who maintains the financial order; Do their partners have more free time or do they have more free time?”
Researchers divide women into three groups and evaluate them accordingly. The first group; It is the group in which women share an equal division of labor with their partners. the other; women do more work than their husbands. The last one is determined as the group where spouses take more responsibility than women. The results of the research are quite interesting. Because women who state that they take equal responsibilities in their relationships have a higher relationship satisfaction than other women. In fact, according to the study, this situation; It also reveals that they feel more sexual desire towards their partners.
From the group in which the partner takes more responsibility, little conclusions can be drawn because their number is very few. This may have made a funny connotation to you as “wherever you go in the world, you may find it difficult to find men who do more housework than women”. But the unsurprising result shows us that the group where women take more responsibility and get tired are less satisfied with the relationship. In other words, this research wants to explain that the low libido of women can be attributed not only to biological reasons, but also to social reasons.
Of course, factors such as a long relationship and children can also be the reason why one party takes more burden in the relationship.
In the research, it is said that long relationships lead to a feeling of excessive familiarity in people, and this issue causes individuals to get bored with their partners. Unfortunately, this situation can also feed the inequalities in the relationship. In fact, experts make an inference that “the longer some relationships last, the more unjust they become”. In fact, most women can start to manage their husband’s life and become a mother to them, while taking care of their own and their children’s lives.
Since psychologists also focus on the unequal division of labor caused by these factors in the relationship, changing such dynamics may restore the balance in the relationship, according to them. Which, we can say, may add vitality to the relationship.
In previous studies, it is said that women who are satisfied with their relationships have more sexual desire. This research also mentions that the libido decreases when both partners have an unequal distribution of tasks and women are given more tasks. Thus, we can say that it is very important for women to feel a sense of justice between themselves and their partners for their satisfaction in their sexual life.
Editor’s Note: In this text, the findings of the researches are discussed. It is an article that does not aim to generalize. In order to form a general judgment on this issue, academic studies need to be conducted in different countries, with different participant groups, by conducting different research methodologies.
- Sources: Science Alert, News 24, The Conversation
- Image Sources: The Guardian, Guardian 2, Fatherly, Cosmopolitan, Blue Heart, Practice Happiness
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