Date Before You Mate

Can’t sex help you determine compatibility?

Compatible compared to what? Sex is meant to be an exploration of two individuals coming together to form a new one. It is meant to be the glue on two pieces who have committed to each other in love. When there is true love the sex will be explosive

Doesn’t sex produce intimacy?

Yes sex of course produces feelings of intimacy. The brain produces chemicals that help individuals par-bond. This is why couples who have sex before marriage experience far more difficulty when they break up. They started bonding. Platonic friends on the other hand find it far easier and less emotionally traumatic when deciding to not continue a romantic relationship.

Scripture is outdated, right?

It goes without saying that many religious traditions do not condone premarital sex. Today, in order to justify this modern behavior many simply say that the religious texts are outdated.

The Complementarity of Men & Women

When God created humanity, he instituted marriage. This is evidenced in the first two chapters of the Bible: “So God created man in his image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. . . . Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Gen. 1:27, 2:24).

That man is created male and female so that husband and wife may bond with each other and engage in procreative activity is evident here. The phrase “they become one flesh” also implies that God originally intended marriage to be a lifelong relationship. Husband and wife enter a covenantal relationship that serves to make a family. continue reading more

Contemporary popular culture is filled with examples that depict and often encourage sexual behavior, including premarital and uncommitted sex. Popular media, including television, has become a source of sex education, filled with (inaccurate) portrayals of sexuality. Many popular representations suggest uncommitted sex, or hookups, can be both biophysically and emotionally enjoyable and occur without “strings.”

Nothing however could be further from the truth. The popularity of hooking up among both men and women presents a problem for approaching human sexuality purely from the perspective of sexual strategies theory.  The popularity of hooking up among both men and women presents a problem for approaching human sexuality purely from the perspective of sexual strategies theory. That both men and women are engaging in this behavior at such high rates is not consistent with the model.

Link to research paper is available here: Hook-ups”: Characteristics and correlates of college students’ spontaneous and anonymous sexual experiences

Sexual Hookup Culture: A Review

Overall research findings strongly suggest that a majority of both men and women are motivated to engage in hookups, but often desire a more romantic relationship. This is consistent with a more nuanced evolutionary biopsychosocial perspective that takes into account social context and the cross-cultural and biological centrality of the pair-bond (Fisher, 1992; Jankowiak & Fischer, 1992; Pedersen et al., 2011; Gray & Garcia, 2013). Hookups, although increasingly socially acceptable, may leave more “strings” than public discourse would suggest.