Do you feel like you align more with bisexuality as you get older? That is totally normal.
How we think about sex and who we want to have it with is changing big time, according to a recent study conducted by the Archives of Sexual Behavior. The research, referenced here by Time Magazine, analyzed survey data from around 30,000 Americans from 1973 to 2014.
It turns out that we are now (finally) way more open to same-sex experiences.
(The number of Americans who had had sex with someone of the same sex doubled between 1990 and 2014—for both men (4.5% in 1990 to 8.2% in 2014) and women (3.6% in 1990 to 8.7% in 2014). These increases didn’t appear to be driven exclusively by people who identify as gay or lesbian, but by people who have had sex with people both sexes, says study author Jean Twenge, a psychology professor at San Diego State University and author of the book Generation Me. The percentage of people who have had sex with both men and women shot up from 3.1 % in 1990 to 7.7%.
“What we’re seeing is this movement toward more sexual freedom,” says Twenge. “There’s more freedom for people to do what they want without following the traditional, often now seen as outdated, social rules about who you’re supposed to have sex with and when.”)
Twenge’s theory prevails in how people think about same-sex hook-ups, too. In the study, only 11% of people in 1973 thought their was a no issue with people have same-sex relations, by 1990 this has increased to 13%. Fast forward to 2014, and a massive 49% of people surveyed (63% being millennials) stated that a same sex relationship was “not wrong at all.”
“Overall, it suggests that our sexuality has become much more free and open, that Americans feel much more freedom to express themselves sexually in a way that they see fit,” Twenge told TIME. “That’s why it comes down to this individualistic viewpoint: do what’s right for you.”
via TIME.