The 'Sex Recession:' How Tech is Contributing to Young People Doing It Less
*By Max Godnick*
If you're searching for hook-ups on social media or via dating apps, you're probably doing it wrong.
Young people are having less sex [according to the latest cover story in The Atlantic](https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/12/the-sex-recession/573949/), and technology is contributing to the generational dry spell.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, only 41 percent of high-school students reported having had sex in 2015 compared to 51 percent in 1991. In 2014, the average American had sex 54 times a year, down from 62 times in the late 1990s.
From economic stress to a rise in anxiety rates, researchers have pegged the decline on a variety of potential factors. But like most everything at the core of millennial sociology ー social media and technology might be to blame for the so-called "sex recession."
"It seems like they would make things easier, and for some people they do, but they don't work they don't work that well for a lot of people," Kate Julian, senior editor at The Atlantic, said of dating apps Thursday in an interview on Cheddar.
"They can be demoralizing and inefficient."
She pins part of the problem on the gamification of online dating ー people report using apps like Tinder for upwards of an hour and a half a day, not to find a potential partner but instead, "for an ego boost or for a diversion," Julian said.
"They're not necessarily following through on it with real-life interactions."
And then, there's porn.
According to Julian, researchers aren't quite sure how the rise in pornography led to a drop in sex, but it's undoubtedly a factor.
"We can say that over the period of time that digital porn has existed, people have reported masturbating a lot more," she explained.
Online porn isn't only causing young people to have less sex ー it's also making sex worse.
"Porn may be changing the way people are having sex to some extent," Julian said. "There are a lot of things that are prevalent in porn that maybe your average person doesn't want to experience," she added citing practices popularized in porn like non-consensual choking.
"It really didn't want to make them come back for more."
But some people are still getting luckyー and possibly even in record numbers.
Julian acknowledged that the sweeping statistical analysis may not reflect the experiences of individuals whose sex lives have been helped by the destigmitazation and digitization of sex.
"Some people very well may be having more sex than ever and there's some data that suggests that, we're just talking about averages," she said.
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/the-atlantic-explains-why-young-people-are-having-less-sex).
Amazon is betting that ammonia could be the fuel of the future, participating in a Series A round for the Brooklyn-based company Amogy in December. Amogy aims to de-carbonize transportation with a clean energy system that uses ammonia as a renewable fuel. Amogy is partnering with Amazon on its first commercial product - an ammonia-powered cargo-shipping vessel. Amogy CEO Seonghoon Woo joins Cheddar Climate to discuss.
One of the world's largest transport companies is kicking off Black History Month with a new initiative aimed at the next generation of business leaders. Today, FedEx announced the launch of its Student Ambassador Program. Participants selected from eight historically black colleges and universities will receive career guidance from FedEx executives. The program is part of FedEx's ongoing commitment to HBCUs and will also help the company expand its pipeline for diverse talent. Cheddar News welcomes senior vice president at FedEx, Jenny Robertson, and Jerryl Briggs, President of Mississippi Valley State University, to discuss.
"Sing 2" has overthrown "Spider-Man: No Way Home" as the number one film at the UK box office. The animated sequel brought in $8.1 million, in just its two first weekends. However, "No Way Home" is still on track to beat "Avatar" as the number one grossing movie of all time.
Big Brothers Big Sisters of America has been a driving force for youth mentorship since 1904. The nonprofit organization is launching its annual Big Draft campaign this month in partnership with the NFL, and Artis Stevens, the first Black CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, joined Cheddar to discuss the push for adding more "Bigs" as mentors on his one-year anniversary leading the non-profit organization. "While the NFL is recruiting and drafting more players, they're also helping us to draft more mentors and, particularly, men all the way from across February to all the way to April of this year," Stevens explained.
The Supreme Court will reconsider race-based affirmative action in college admissions. The court will examine admissions policies at Harvard University and The University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, which count the race of applicants as a factor in admissions. The court has upheld affirmative action policies in the past, saying it helps to create more diverse student bodies. However, the conservative Supreme Court could be skeptical and even possibly hostile to such policies. Nick Anderson, Higher Education Writer, Washington Post joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
The value of most cryptocurrencies have plummeted in recent months since reaching all-time highs in November, wiping out more than $1 trillion in value globally. The steep crash has some talking about the possibility of a crypto winter, a term referring to a prolonged bearish period where asset prices persistently fall over many months. This all comes as the Fed is expected to raise interest rates, and the Biden administration is working on an executive order to regulate Bitcoin and other assets. Josh Goodbody, COO of Qredo, joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss the crypto crash, and how the industry might recover from it.
Recent data reveals that streaming giants are struggling to retain subscribers in the months following a major release.
According to data from Antenna, subscriber trends show that users will subscribe to a given streaming service just to watch a particular show, and then cancel those subscriptions shortly after. This comes as the streaming space continues to heat up as new entrants crowd the space. Jon Christian, Founding Partner + Digital Supply Chain Leader at OnPrem joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
The EU relaxed its Covid travel restrictions for vaccinated individuals among the union's 27 member states, doing away with testing or quarantine requirements for travelers. This comes soon after the World Health Organization said the omicron variant could help make the pandemic more manageable. The new rules take effect February 1st. Bryce Conway, Founder, 10xTravel joined Cheddar's Opening Bell to discuss.
If you're in China you may have noticed that the 1999 film "Fight Club" which features Brad Pitt has somehow got itself a new ending. In the new ending on the streaming service Tencent, the narrator is killed and the explosions are replaced with a black screen saying "the police arrested criminals".It's unclear as to exactly why the changes were made. However, it is the latest example of China playing by its own rules when it comes to entertainment and attempting to control everything its citizens watch. Media Reporter at Axios, Sarah Fisher, joined Cheddar to discuss more.
