Sexuality: Measures of Partnerships, Practices, Attitudes, and Problems in the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Study

TLDR

The National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project was designed to examine how sexual behavior, problems, and health interrelate among older adults. The study aims to describe and construct measures of sexual partnerships, practices, problems, attitudes, and intimacy in older adults, and to use these measures to examine sexuality and its links to health and well‑being. Using first‑wave NSHAP data, the authors described and compared sexual measures across age and gender, and constructed and evaluated scales of sexual mores, interest, and relationship satisfaction. Older adults’ sexuality varies by age and gender, with men more likely to have partners, be sexually active, and hold permissive attitudes, and with substantial age‑related differences in partnership, behavior, problems, and attitudes that differ between men and women.

Abstract

The National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project (NSHAP) was designed to examine the relationship between sexual behavior, sexual problems, and health among older women and men. We describe measures of sexual partnerships, sexual practices, sexual problems, attitudes toward sex, and nonsexual intimacy in the first wave of NSHAP. We compare measures of sexuality for those 57–85 years old, by age, separately for men and women. We construct scales of sexual mores, sexual interest, and relationship satisfaction and discuss properties of each scale. Sexuality among older adults tends to vary with age and gender. At all ages in this study, men are more likely than women to have a partner, more likely to be sexually active with that partner, and tend to have more positive and permissive attitudes toward sex. The proportions in a sexual partnership, behavior, problems, and attitudes all differ substantially by age. And these age patterns often differ for men and women. Data obtained in the NSHAP can be used to construct key measures of sexuality among older adults; to examine sexuality itself; and to explore the link between sexuality, health, well-being, and other dimensions of the lives of older adults.