Why aren’t young people having sex any more?

Comedy film No sex please – we're British was released in 1973 with a predominantly young cast and too much ambiguity. Half a century later, the name seems more appropriate than ever, at least among younger members of society. Rates of sexual activity among teens and young adults appear to have declined over the past few decades—but there's more to it than that. takes place in Britain.

In the United States in 2010, 12 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds reported not having had sex in the past year, according to the General Social Survey, a long-running sociological survey. In 2024, this figure has doubled.

Similar declines in sexual activity among young people are occurring in high-income countries such as Australia And Germany. But this is most noticeable in Japan, with recent review found that about half of Japanese remain sexually inexperienced until the age of 20. This may explain why the number of deaths in Japan exceeds the number of births by almost 1 million According to then-Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, 2024 would see a “silent emergency.” So what's going on and is this really an emergency?

Of course, the number of people having sex has always fluctuated, says Kay Wellings at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. In the 1950s, she said, the norm was to wait until you were married, and then when birth control pills became available in the 1960s, “there was talk of a kind of free lunch, you could have sex without any consequences.” The onset of the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s made people much more reserved, she said. “But I think the '90s is a time when the imperative changed and became an imperative to promote sex.”

The current decline in sexual activity among young people has no clear explanation. Some say today's tight financial climate prevents them from being more independent. For example, in 2023, 18 percent of people aged 25 to 34 in the US lived in my parents' house – up from 9 percent in 2000. “If you live at home, it's not necessarily the most conducive environment for a lot of sex,” says Luke Branning at the University of Leeds, UK.

Youth unemployment is also high in countries such as the UKwhich may partly explain why, on average, sexual inactivity seems to be somewhat more pronounced among young men than young women – and the chances increase if they are unemployed or have a low income. “A man's earning power or financial status shouldn't be considered attractive, but if you look at the research, it seems to be a universal pattern,” says Peter Ueda at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

Another factor could be the rise in sobriety if it makes young people more inhibited. A report Analytics firm Gallup found that the share of 18- to 34-year-olds in the U.S. who say they drink alcohol has fallen from 72 percent to 62 percent over the past two decades, but drinking has risen from 49 percent to 59 percent among people age 55 and older. “You can relate this to the 'sensible generation,'” Wellings says. “This label is given to young people who drink less and use fewer drugs. [and] have less sex.”

Then there are technological advances. The younger generation seems to have changed personal communication for digital devices, but sexual encounters usually require physical contact. “Gen Z has been called the most connected but loneliest generation because they are really connected to each other, but mostly they are really connected to screens,” says Natasha McKeeveralso at the University of Leeds. “This may mean they are more nervous about face-to-face interactions.”

In theory, dating apps have made communication easier than ever before, but their adoption began in the early 2010s. did not coincide with the increase in sexual contacts among young people. “These apps weren't designed to get people to actually engage in sexual intercourse, but to get them hooked on them,” he says. Andras Kolto at the University of Galway, Ireland. Users are now increasingly logoutwith some research linking dating app use to depression and anxiety.

Mental health problems can also contribute to decreased sexual activity. Lancet Psychiatry warning that we have “entered a dangerous phase” with these problems among young people. “If people don't feel good, they may not always be ready to have sex,” Brunning says. Anxiety can even become a self-perpetuating cycle. “Sex can be a very scary and intimidating experience, and the less you do it, the less comfortable you feel,” says McKeever. “So, if people don't have sex for a long period of time, maybe they get to the point where they really want to have sex and they start to get really anxious about it.”

For some, this inaction is troubling, given that sex is about improving quality of life And general healthand about half of women and two thirds of men report wanting more. “When we see a decline in sex, the main problem is that we see more and more people unable to live the life that they themselves consider meaningful, valuable and important,” says Lyman Stone at the Institute of Family Studies in Virginia.

But not everyone agrees that this has a negative impact on young people if they are happy with their situation. For example, study heterosexual people aged 18 to 39 in Japan found that about half of single people were not interested in romantic relationships. “There may be more things for young people to do now than in the past,” McKeever says. “There are a lot more opportunities for travel. People have more varied careers. Sex isn't the only good thing in life.”

The shift could also be explained by a decrease in stigma against some young people not wanting to have sex, McKeever says, perhaps due to increased awareness of consent in the wake of the #MeToo movement or because young people now feel more comfortable. identifying as asexual. “When I was younger, I felt like a lot of people only had sex because they thought it was something they had to do to be cool, or it was a rite of passage, whereas now I think younger people are more aware.”

Of course, knowing exactly how sexual activity has changed among young people is limited by data problems. People may exaggerate or minimize their experiences depending on whether they are asked about them in person, through an online survey, or according to the taboo of the time. “When the social climate is such that taboos are very strong, you will underreport. Sometimes, when it is considered status giving, you will overreport,” Wellings says. Studies also vary in how they define gender or the young person.

Additionally, there is the issue of volunteer bias: certain types of people tend to participate in such studies, making the results less applicable to the general population. “The Internet population tends to give preference to the young, single, childless [people]” says Stone.

Hard numbers aside, researchers are unanimous that young people are having less sex than older people their age. Similar to the situation in Japan, this coincided with the birth rate reaching a record low in United Kingdom And US.

So is the lack of sex a social emergency as the number of children dwindles? No, says Colto, who expects changing circumstances will eventually cause the numbers to start trending again as they have in previous decades. “A decline in adolescent sexual activity will certainly not be the end [the] the human race,” he says.

“I don't think we have evidence that the situation [in the West] is still considered a problem,” says McKeever. But if politicians are concerned about the lack of sex, there are some solutions. “Young people [having] Less sex than a few decades ago is a symptom of a pandemic of alienation [and] cost of living and housing,” Colto says. “Politicians should take care of solving these issues, then sex will take care of itself.”