Sexual Trends in Malta

The study shows that less than 20% of the participants who are not single have a desire to have sex with another person who is not their partner (19.0%).

Data from this study shows that more than 30% of non-single men sometimes have a sexual desire for someone who is not their partner (31.4%). Only 7% of women have a desire to have sex with an another person. 

With regards to age, the average of participants aged under 25 years desire to have sex other than their partner amounts to 25.5%, for those in the age bracket between 26 and 35 years, 11.8% have the same dsires. Compratively, the percentage goes up to 23% for the age brackets of the under 45 years. Similarly, thepeople aged between 46 and 55 years 23.8% said that they have this desire. The people aged between 55 years-old and 65 years-old (22.2%) desire to have a sexual intercourse with someone esle other than their partner. Lastly, only 9.1% of respondents aged 66 years and over reported to have this urge.  

Participants who are separted and/or divorced are more likely to have desire to have sex with someone other than their partner (64.3%) than participants who are married (17.4%) or in a relationship (19.4%) with respectively 46.9 points and 44.6 points of difference. 

Less than a quarter of participants who work and who are not single often desire to have sex with another partner (22.7%) while among participants who are studying or unemployed, half of them often desire for another person other than their partner (50%).

Participants living in South Eastern were the least likely to want to have sex with someone other than their partner, with an average of 6.7%.

Finally, this study shows that half of the participants who are not at all satisfied with their sex life would like more sex while only 16.7% of the participants who are satisfied with their sex life want more sex.

This study conducted by Sagalytics and Sex Clinic Malta brings to light the reality of individuals who have sexual affairs outside of their main relationship. Respondents were asked this question: Have you ever had sex with more than one person at a time? 

Of the 400 individuals living in Malta, aged 18 and over, that participated in the survey, only 11.6% of the respondents said that they had had sexual contact with another person when they were in a relationship with someone else. In contrast, 88.4% said that they had not. 

Moreover, in this research, respondents were also asked the question: Have you ever had sex with more than one person at a time? Of the 400 individuals taking part in this research, almost ninety five percent of the respondents said that they had had sex with one person at a time (94.1%). In contrast, 5.9% said that they had had sex with more than one person at a time. 

Other studies have also explored similar research questions. One such study is that of Gordon & Mitchell (2020), that was conducted on American citizens right after the Co-Vid 19 pandemic and explored the topic of sexual affairs in order to try and understand better whether increased stress brought on by the pandemic may be putting couples at an increased risk for experiencing 

infidelity. Their results demonstrated that cheating or infidelity occurs in approximately 25% of marriages (Gordon & Mitchell, 2020). The prevalence estimates for sexual affairs occurring outside of the main relationship range between 20% and 52% depending on the way infidelity is defined and measured (Mark & Haus, 2019; Thompson & O’Sullivan, 2016). Similarly, a very recent study by Vowels et al. (2022) demonstrates that between 17.4% and 32.0% of participants engaged in sexual relations outside of the main relationship. 

Another study conducted by Knopp et al. (2017) addressed the risk for serial infidelity by following 484 adult participants longitudinally. The participants in this research reported their sexual relations with someone other than their partner, as well as both known and suspected sexual relations of their partners in each romantic relationship. It was found that 44% of American adults report that they engaged in infidelity (Knopp et al., 2017). 

According to statistics collected through the General Social Survey (GSS, 2018), men are more likely than women to cheat: 20% of men and 13% of women reported that they’ve had sex with someone other than their spouse while married, according to this data. Similarly, Tsapelas et al. (2010) found that 20-40% of heterosexual of married men and 20-25% of heterosexual married women will have an extramarital affair during their lifetime. Moreover, according to Wang (2018), 

there is a gender gap in the prevalence of sexual affairs and that this also varies by age. She found that among ever-married adults ages 18 to 29, women are slightly more likely than men to be guilty of infidelity (11% vs. 10%), but this gap was reversed amongst those aged 30-34, and that we continue to see a wider gap in older age groups. 

This research by Sex Clinic Malta and Sagylitics explored the number of sexual partners that male respondents and female respondents had, and found that male respondents have had sex with more partners than female respondents (6 – male vs 4 – female). In research carried out by Rhodes et al. (2005), exploring the correlation between attractiveness and number of sexual

partners, found that in general, compared with females, males reported significantly more short-term partners. According to Hakim (2010), recent sex surveys show that the average number of sexual partners over a lifetime is two to three times higher among men. In most 

cultures, men are more promiscuous than women, and celibacy is more common among women (Hakim, 2010). 

Furthermore, this research by Sex Clinic Malta and Sagylitics has found that the younger the age of the respondents, the more different partners they had had sex with. Most of the respondents had sex with 2 to 5 different partners (39.1%). The average was 5 different partners. Additionally, respondents who have the highest level of education are the ones who mostly had sex with different partners (the number was 6 partners). Haderxhanaj et al. (2014) looked at the average number of sex partners by age: in the age group 20-24 years, for example, among women, 35% had had 0-1 partners, 29% had had 2-4 partners, and another 23% had had 5-9 partners. At the same time, the results of this research found that the younger the age of the respondents, the more different partners they had sex with.

The average age of having sex for the first time is 19 years old. Men had sex for the first time before women with an average age of 19. The average for women is 20 years old.

We notice that the youngest age of participants who had sex for the first time was 17 years old whereas the oldest age of participants in this study who had sex for the first time were 23 years.

Widowed participants of this study had sex for the first time at 21 years old, followed by married participants (20 years old). Conversely, those who participants who fall in the category of being ‘in a relationship’ and those who are separated/divorced/annulled both recorded their age to be of 17 years as the first time they had sex.

18 years old is the average age of participants having sex for the first time for 3 districts of Malta (Southern Harbour, Northern and Western). Gozitan participants scored as the people who had the first sexual encounter later in life, at the age of 22 years. 

Taking into consideration the activity status, the lowest average concerns students, and unemployed participants with 16 years old. 

Finally, participants who are very satisfied with their sex life had sex for the first time at age 18. Two points difference are noticed with participants who are not at all satisfied with their sex life (20 years).

According to the data collected from more than 100 000 women from Norway, Denmark and Sweden it was reported that the median age to have sex for the first time for these women was of 16, 17 and 17 years old, respectively (Hansen et al., 2020). 

In a seperate study conducted in the United States by Magnusson et al., in 2015 it was found that Sexual debut at less than 15 years is associated with both concurrency and serial monogamy with 1–3 month gaps between partners in U.S. women aged 21–44.

References 

Coop Gordon, K., & Mitchell, E. A. (2020). Infidelity in the Time of COVID‐19. Family process, 59(3), 956-966. 

Haderxhanaj, L. T., Leichliter, J. S., Aral, S. O., & Chesson, H. W. (2014). Sex in a lifetime: Sexual behaviors in the United States by lifetime number of sex partners, 2006–2010. Sexually transmitted diseases, 41(6), 345. 

Knopp K, Scott S, Ritchie L, Rhoades GK, Markman HJ, Stanley SM. Once a Cheater, Always a Cheater? Serial Infidelity Across Subsequent Relationships. Arch Sex Behav. 2017 Nov;46(8):2301-2311. doi: 10.1007/s10508-017-1018-1. 

Mark, K. P., & Haus, K. R. (2019). Extradyadic relations. In A. C. Michalos (Ed.), Encyclopedia of quality of life and well-being research (pp. 2102–2105). Springer. 

Thompson, A. E., & O’Sullivan, L. F. (2016). Drawing the line: The development of a comprehensive assessment of infidelity judgments. Journal of Sex Research, 53(8), 910–926. 

Tsapelas, I, HE Fisher, and A Aron (2010) “Infidelity: when, where, why.” IN WR Cupach and BH Spitzberg, The Dark Side of Close Relationships II, New York: Routledge, pp 175-196. 

Vowels, L. M., Vowels, M. J., & Mark, K. P. (2022). Is infidelity predictable? Using explainable machine learning to identify the Most important predictors of infidelity. The Journal of Sex Research, 59(2), 224-237. 

Wang, W. (2018). Who Cheats More? The Demographics of Infidelity in America. Institute for Family Studies. https://ifstudies.org/blog/who-cheats-more-the-demographics-of-cheating-in-america

Hansen, B. T., Kjær, S. K., Arnheim‐Dahlström, L., Liaw, K. L., Juul, K. E., Thomsen, L. T., ... & Nygård, M. (2020). Age at first intercourse, number of partners and sexually transmitted infection prevalence among Danish, Norwegian and Swedish women: Estimates and trends from nationally representative cross‐sectional surveys of more than 100 000 women. Acta obstetricia et gynecologica Scandinavica, 99(2), 175-185.

Magnusson, B. M., Nield, J. A., & Lapane, K. L. (2015). Age at first intercourse and subsequent sexual partnering among adult women in the United States, a cross-sectional study. BMC Public Health, 15, 1-9.

Magnusson BM, Nield JA, Lapane KL. Age at first intercourse and subsequent sexual partnering among adult women in the United States, a cross-sectional study. BMC Public Health. 2015 Feb 7;15:98. doi: 10.1186/s12889-015-1458-2. PMID: 25884406; PMCID: PMC4328838.