Tuesday, May 13, 2008
A cross-cultural study finds that Americans go more for one-night stands, the French favor long-term affairs -- and French women over 50 have a lot more sex.
Jun 20, 2003 | Frenchwomen have always had a singular allure about them. It's not so much their total lack of body fat or those pert little breasts that can fit into the rim of a champagne glass. It's their infuriating poise and inscrutable sensuality that has captivated us for centuries. "A comparison of Amazons to Angels," is how Thomas Jefferson characterized the difference between the liberated Frenchwomen (he was scandalized by them) and the virtuous American maidens of his time. A century later, those "Amazons" would teach American GIs a few tricks about "Frenching and the French way." Since then, Americans have rushed to France in search of intellectual freedom, good food and good sex (not necessarily in that order).
But the land of oo-la-la and voulez-vous coucher avec moi is not exactly what you think it is. In 2001, the Journal of Sex Research published the results of a Franco-American research project titled "A Comparative Study of the Couple in the Social Organization of Sexuality in France and the United States." The study both reaffirms and busts open many of our long-standing myths about the French with compelling sociocultural data that, in light of the current chilling of Franco-American relations, merits a double take.
The study reveals that the French have fewer partners overall than Americans, maintain more long-term committed relationships, are more likely to be monogamous (surprise!), and enjoy more frequent sex. (Sixty-nine percent of single Frenchmen and 85 percent of single Frenchwomen report fidelity to one single sexual partner, compared to 48 percent of American men and 66 percent of American women.) But one of the most striking differences was between older French- and American women. The study reports that after the age of 50, American women are 10 percent less likely than Frenchwomen to be living in a couple.
These differences are even more dramatic with age. "While 79 percent of the 50 to 54 year olds (in France) are living in a couple, only 60 percent of the 55 to 59 year olds (in the U.S.) are in the same situation." (The study was based on 3,432 American adults ages 18 to 59 surveyed in the National Health and Social Life Survey, and 4,580 French adults between the ages of 18 and 59 from the Analysis of Sexual Behavior in France survey.)
What's this all about -- and are there implicit lessons here from the land that brought us the French lover? We caught up with Alain Giami, director of research at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research (and co-director of the study with John Gagnon, at the State University of New York, Stony Brook), to help us out.
You've referred to "the eroticization of social relations in France." Could you comment on what you mean by this?
The eroticization of social relations has to do with the fact that it seems that the French do not consider "flirtation" and seduction and romance as a direct sexual approach, and that flirtation does not lead necessarily to sexual intercourse. The notion of "complicité" [complicity] is very important both for Frenchmen and -women. The language of seduction is not an explicit language of sex. In fact, the eroticization is grounded on nonsexual attributes and more on classical gender roles.
Can you elaborate on these "nonsexual attributes"?
Eroticization has more to do with the double meaning in words and situations. Most French words, and especially most verbs such as "to make" [faire], "to take" [prendre] and "to put" [mettre], are all metaphors for the genital act - which is now called the "penile-vaginal act" in the States. So you can imagine the possible range of understatements and "malentendus" [misunderstandings] which can create "complicité" between potential partners in France.
By "classical gender roles" are you suggesting that in France, men are men and women are women -- that they fully assume their sexuality (and "traditional gender identities") without apology, without fear of being politically incorrect or sexist?
Yes. There is also less contradiction between being sexy and being a professional. Moreover, the Antioch code of negotiation [a student code of sexual conduct on the Antioch college campus intended to "prevent sexual offenses" and legislate "specific verbal consent ... obtained with each new level of physical and/or sexual conduct/contact in any given interaction"] is almost unthinkable in France. People are more able to negotiate by eye contact -- but to explicitly negotiate the acts of sex is perceived as being a kind of pornography when you don't know the other person.
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