Gen Z ‘sex recession’ rages on - experts think they know what’s causing it

It seems that Gen Z are having less sex than ever compared to their predecessors, and experts reckon they've worked out why.

Recent stats from Lovehoney showed that Boomers - those born between 1946 and 1964 - have sex 47 times a year, which works out at 0.9 times a week.

Gen X averaged out a little higher at 1.2 times a week, while Millennials - aged 27 to 43 - topped the poll with a weekly average of 1.4 times.

Gen Z, meanwhile, came out the lowest at 0.7 times a week. But why?

Journalist Carter Sherman - who specialises in sexuality and gender - dove into what’s causing this sexual 'drought' for her new book, The Second Coming: Sex and the Next Generation’s Fight Over Its Future.

There has been lots of speculation about the cause of Gen Z's 'sex recession' (Maskot / Getty Images)

Sherman told WIRED: “Many of them [Gen Z] are very horny. They would like to be having sex, and in fact they feel a lot of shame over the fact that they haven't had sex yet or that they’re not having sex enough.

“They're sort of swimming in this miasma of anxiety from a lot of different sources that are contributing to a lack of desire or lack of ability to connect with people enough in order to have sex with them.”

So what does Sherman's research - which consisted of interviewing more than 100 people under 30 years old - say is the cause?

She claimed that Gen Z are ‘a generation that understood that what happens in the bedroom is influenced by what happens outside of it’.

Social media

The expert explained that, when we constantly see so many perfectly posed bodies online, we disengage with trying to find pride in our own.

“[Gen Z] do this thing called ‘comparing and despairing,’ which basically means that they feel like their bodies are not as good as other people's, and that can make people less interested in sex,” Sherman said.

Carter Sherman sees social media as one of the biggest causes (Halfpoint Images / Getty Images)

Politicisation

Sherman claimed that sexual politics can affect Gen Z’s sex drive, explaining: “They're also dealing with just an incredible amount of politicisation of sex at this time. They're living in a post-Roe reality, they’re living in a post-#MeToo reality.”

The pandemic

She also believes that the Covid-19 pandemic had an effect on young people’s ability to connect with each other.

“I think what it did is sort of speed up a process that was already happening, which is the outsourcing of a lot of sexuality to the internet, because that was their only outlet for sex, in a lot of ways,” Sherman noted.

“This was happening in some ways that were helpful, because, you know, I think in particular the internet has been really great for young LGBTQ+ folks to find information about themselves. And in some ways that made people more fearful of sex.”

Porn

Sherman's research found that normalisation of more violent sex has led people to disengage.

“A lot of young people told me that they felt like porn had normalised ‘rough sex’ and in particular had normalised choking,” she continued.

“If you're under 40, you are almost twice as likely to have been choked during sex.”

The expert noted that the 'Manosphere' could be causing Gen Z to abstain from sex (Dikushin / Getty Images)

The 'Manosphere'

With the apparent rise of the 'Manosphere' - the controversial online network that promotes misogyny and discourages female empowerment - Sherman noted that some women may be afraid to trust men.

She shared one story of a woman who felt 'that the manospheric incel-y beliefs have so permeated gender relations that you can't trust men, at this point, to not be secret misogynists'.

“And so she's just abstaining from sex totally,” the journalist said.

Dating apps

Sherman views these as an arm of social media and believes that 'they make you very aware of your sexual value and oftentimes make you feel like you're lacking in some way'.

She concluded: “I actually don't care very much about whether or not young people are having sex or not having sex. What I worry about is whether or not young people are connecting with one another and whether or not they're growing in their relationships, in themselves, if they're not engaging in sexual, romantic relationships to the extent that they want them.

“I just worry that there is a dearth of willingness to be vulnerable in a way that I think is not only bad for individuals but bad for politics, because it diminishes our ability to connect with one another and understand one another's differences.”