Facebook: Equality is sexy…
You know what makes everyone happy?
Equality.
Earlier today, we pointed to new research that suggests that dads who share an equal of division of responsibility with respect to their kids enjoy higher levels of personal and professional satisfaction.
Now, there’s evidence that couples who divide the household chores evenly have more sex (which likely makes them happier in general).
In contrast to earlier research that found that egalitarian couples have less sex, the new findings suggest the opposite holds true for chore-sharing significant others.
Previous research seemed to suggest it was less “sexy” for the man to take on certain tasks that were traditionally reserved for women. This was shown in a 2012 study from the American Sociological Review that found that there was less sex in a relationship when a man performed certain household tasks.
But that was so a few years ago – a lot has changed with the growing and impossible-to-ignore gender equality movement.
A new study, which is discussed in a briefing paper ahead of being published in an upcoming issue of Journal of Marriage and Family, drew upon more recent self-reported data.
They compared it to what respondents said two decades before, looking at results from the 2006 Marital and Relationship Survey and the National Survey of Families and Households, which collected data from 1992 to 1994. Both surveys divided the couples into three categories: traditional couples where the woman did 65 per cent or more of the housework, more or less egalitarian couples in which the man did between 35 to 65 percent of the housework, and counter-conventional couples, in which men did 65 per cent more of the housework.
Somewhat surprising given the prevalence of women in the workforce, in the early 90s these “counter-conventional” couples were pretty rare. Back then, 80 per cent of the respondents claimed that the women did most of the housework. Those who had a more equal division of chores reported having less sex and less satisfaction with sex, compared to other couples.
But times have changed.
The 2006 MARS report saw sexual frequency rise only in those couples who enjoyed a more equally divided approach to housework. Couples who shared housework equally had sex 6.8 times per month on average. While that’s not particularly high, it’s 0.5 times more per month than those with more conventional arrangements. Interestingly, it’s more than twice as often as couples who reported that men did most of the housework.
So if your sex life is leaving something to be desired, you may want to pull up a spreadsheet and divide up those chores now.
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