A study, published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine summarizes data collected from the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior that focuses on adolescent masturbation.
The data, from 820 adolescents between the ages of 14 and 17, are presented in a wonderfully clear and relatively un-editorial fashion, offering us a description of something most of us think we understand and few of us ever talk about. A few of the findings:
How Common Is Adolescent Masturbation?
- 61% of adolescents report masturbating at least once in their lives
- 56% report masturbating in the past year
- 47% report masturbating in the past three months
How Often Do Teens Masturbate?
- 36% reported masturbating a few times a year
- 28% said they masturbated a few times per month
- 22% masturbated 2 or 3 times a week
- 13% said they masturbated 4 or more times per week
Who Masturbates Most?
Comparing data on lifetime masturbation
- Overall males reported masturbating more than females (74% versus 48%)
- Older participants reported masturbating more than younger (53% of 14 year-olds compared with 69% of 17 year-olds)
In asking the questions (all of which was done online), the authors defined masturbation as being alone and "stimulating your body for sexual pleasure, whether or not you had an orgasm." In addition to questions about prevalence and frequency, the authors asked about partnered sexual behaviors and condom use.
No Substitute for Partner Sex: Masturbation Gets You Laid
Since masturbation is a kind of sex in its own right, I often point out to people I'm talking to that masturbation gets you laid. But the findings of this study offer some data behind that linguistic manipulation. Adolescents who reported masturbating at least once in the past year were more likely to have engaged in sexual activity with a partner (they asked about a range of activities including partnered masturbation, oral sex, vaginal intercourse, and anal intercourse). Conversely youth who didn't masturbate weren't engaging in any partnered sexual activity more than youth who were masturbating.
This is interesting as the data could be used to refute two common assumptions about masturbation. First, that people who masturbate aren't having sex with anyone else (among these youth those who masturbate are more likely to have sex with other people). Second, that masturbation is a useful tool in delaying partnered sexual activity. This is a claim that I've heard sex educators make as a justification for teaching masturbation. While I understand the motivation for making this claim (even though I don't agree with it) I've never fully bought it. These data can't prove or disprove anything, but sex educators who try to encourage parents to talk about masturbation as a way of helping kids delay partnered sex need to deal with the numbers in some way.
Is Masturbation Associated with Sexual Self-Awarness?
This is another one of those ideas that sex educators talk about a lot. When I was trained I learned to talk about masturbation as a cornerstone of sexual health. And certainly it's my go-to suggestion for people of all ages who haven't found a way to feel pleasure in their bodies.
The authors were interested in this question and decided to ask about condom use as one way of getting at what other benefits masturbation may bring (as if sexual pleasure wasn't enough). They didn't find a consistent association between masturbation in the past year and condom use. I'm kind of encouraged by this because even though I do believe that masturbation can be a positive part of most people's lives, I think we need to be cautious about talking about a sexual activity as if it has intrinsic meaning. Masturbation may make one more aware of their body, but it can also make you more tuned out. Plenty of us masturbate in ways that are unconscious, and not very healthy. We can tell ourselves terrible things about ourselves while masturbating. We can make ourselves feel ashamed and dirty and pathetic while masturbating. We may also feel pleasure while we do this. That kind of tension is one of the amazing things about being human, it's also one of the things that make quantitative science such a poor tool for understanding experience.
Limitations of the Study
The problems with this study are about what you'd expect from this kind of research. It's only as representative a sample as any of this research ever can be (which means that they use lots of words and statistical justifications and still huge swaths of the public are left out). Because their overall sample was small, many of their sub-samples were tiny, often under 100 people. Many of the other ways that research like this fails were neatly avoided by presenting the data as descriptive, and avoiding a lot of editorial commentary. It's too bad they muddied the waters in a single paragraph of evolutionary psychology and brain research psycho-babble about gender differences (something that's still in fashion and consistently mis-represented).
In the end though the authors are not trying to make a lot of over reaching claims about what their data means. Their point is simple, and however the numbers breakdown or whatever you want to say to justify it, what they say about their research in the introduction is hard to argue with:
"Improved understanding of masturbation is critical to a comprehensive understanding of healthy adolescent sexual development."
Source:
Robbins, C.L., Schick, V., Reece, M., et. al. "Prevalence, Frequency, and Associations of Masturbation With Partnered Sexual Behaviors Among US Adolescents" Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine Published online August 1, 2011.
