Women Are Happier in Relationships When Their Partners Believe This 1 Thing

If you believe most of the bad stand-up jokes about the sex lives of long-term couples, you probably think that women never want to have sex and men are always game for it. Also, you probably live in 1992 and that concerns me. The reality is, the sexual desire of both genders is bound to fluctuate, and it can be tough to know when your partner is game and when they just want to watch Game of Thrones.

A new study published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology asked long-term couples to complete surveys about their sexual desire both at the start of the study and throughout the study over a period of 21 days, Broadly reports. 

They found that men in long-term relationships tended to underperceive their long-term partner's sexual desire more than women did. Even more interesting, women who were in relationships with men who under-perceived their sexual desire reported being happier and more committed to the relationship. 

So why are women happier when their partners assume they rarely want to have sex with them? One of the study's authors, Dr. Amy Muise, suggests it could be because their partners are more likely to put in more effort to get them turned on and into bed. Muise explains: "If a person over-perceives how interested their partner is in having sex, they might feel as though they don't have to do anything to set the mood or attract their partner's interest. But, if a person sees their partner as having less desire than they actually report, the person might put forth a little extra effort to ignite their sexual interest."

Another possibility is that men might find it easier to assume their partners don't want to have sex in order to avoid sexual rejection, which Muise says "tends to be associated with negative consequences for relationships." 

The last theory presented by Muise comes from another Journal of Personality and Social Psychology​ study. The study states that men are often exposed to media images where women are shown as being "initially coy but then overcome with sexual desire." So if those images were accurate, assuming their partners rarely wanted to have sex would not only make sense to them, it would also lessen their potential for sexual rejection.  

Any way you look at it, this is a very good example of why couples should be more open about their needs and wants. Unless of course you're one of the women from the study who loves how hard her partner works to get her into bed. In which case, I salute you.