Sex, with an Explanation

Every major religion attempts to contain sexual intimacy within the sanctity of marriage, but not all faiths remotely generate their goals. Abstinence programs in the United States are the stuff of Saturday Night Live skits, and teen pregnancy in the United States is hitting epidemic proportions. But out there in the “world,” the question is how effective religious teachings are in thwarting pre- and extramarital sex.

Amy Adamczyk of the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, co-authored a study (published in the American Sociological Review) with John Jay doctoral student Brittany E. Hayes looking at exactly how effective various religions were in reducing these non-marital sexual practices. “Drawing on the Demographic and Health Surveys funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development, the study included data from 31 developing nations collected between 2000 and 2008. The authors focused on individuals’ responses to questions on religious affiliation, marital status, and sexual behavior outside of marriage.” Huffington Post, October 28^th.

People may argue that the report is too “religiously-centric” without taking into consideration the relative educational and sophistication of the relevant selected population. Some point out that many small towns, defined by tribalism and with limited social mobility, would react the same way regardless of religion. Modernity, not religious practices, have to be a major factor… not to mention legal systems (which may be religiously based) that impose severe penalties for anyone violating sexual norms, including death by stoning for adulterers. Keeping these factors in the back of your mind, here is what the authors found.

“Adamczyk said the study evolved from another study she was doing that found countries with large Muslim populations have very low rates of HIV and AIDS. ‘I was trying to figure out why that would be,’ she said. One reason she considered was lower rates of sex outside of marriage… The authors hypothesized that the larger the proportion of Muslims and Hindus in a country, the lower the rates of premarital and extramarital sex.

“Adamczyk and Hayes found that 94 percent of Jews in the nations they studied reported having premarital sex, compared to 79 percent of Christians, 65 percent of Buddhists, 43 percent of Muslims and 19 percent of Hindus… As for extramarital sex, 4 percent of Jews reported having sex outside of marriage, compared to 3 percent of Christians. Less than one percent each of Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists reported having extramarital sex… ‘In many countries around the world -- but in Muslim countries specifically, there's just much less interaction between the sexes,’ said Adamczyk. ‘It's just going to be much less likely that they're going to meet a potentially romantic partner.’” Huffington Post.

The Rev. Paul Sullins, a sociologist at the Catholic University of America kind of said it best: “The burqa really works… When you cover your women head to toe with cloth to keep them from being viewed by men outside their family, and you keep them strictly segregated from men throughout their growing years until they get married, you're going to have less premarital sex.” Huffington Post. D’oh!

I’m Peter Dekom, and these studies are interesting… to a point!