Decline in sexual activity among college students

According to an American College Health Association survey:

for male students, the number of sexual partners in the previous year has dropped, from 2.1 in 2000 to 1.6 in 2006. According to a Centers for Disease Control survey, the number of ninth- to 12th-grade students who have had sex dropped almost 10 percent, to fewer than half of respondents, between 1991 and 2005. And a 2001 study found that 39 percent of freshman college women were virgins, and 31 percent of those women still hadn’t had sex by senior year. In 2006, nearly half of Harvard undergrads who responded to a survey reported they had never had intercourse. (Newsweek)

While the Newsweek article sites abstinence education and a greater awareness of the risks affiliated with casual sex as possible causes of the decline. Isn’t it possible that the greater openness to discuss sexual experiences and human sexuality may be a factor? The explosion in sex columns in college newspapers and campus magazines like Boink and H Bomb comes in part because Gen Y is more open when it comes to differences between people (whether race, sexuality, etc). Frank discussions on college campus means exploring the bounds of sexuality are no longer followed by the “walk of shame ” back to your dorm room the morning after; rather , it’s an accepted part of the process of discovering yourself. Ironically, the publications become more risque in adult minds than sex itself, making the discussion of sex more rebellious than the act of sexual conquest. Thus, fewer college students get laid

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