{"id":33402,"date":"2021-03-20T20:51:40","date_gmt":"2021-03-20T19:51:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/?p=33402"},"modified":"2021-03-30T12:08:36","modified_gmt":"2021-03-30T10:08:36","slug":"sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/","title":{"rendered":"Want to Boost Your Mood? Research Says Have Happy Sex"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">March 20th marks International Day of Happiness, and we\u2019re dedicating the latest research to sex and happiness, that is, why sex makes us feel good and what we can do to have sex that makes us happy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-33403 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/international-day-of-happiness.jpg\" alt=\"sex and international day of happiness\" width=\"660\" height=\"330\" \/><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What Does Sex Mean?<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We may ask ourselves, what does sex mean to a woman? What does sex mean to a man? What does sex mean to people at different ages? The most accurate answer is that sex means different things to different people at different life stages. However, there are some general ideas we can gather from social and relationship psychologists.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When problems exist in a relationship, more than half the time, sex is also absent. Most often, when one partner can\u2019t get over an issue, they begin to feel used and decide to no longer engage. There are two primary reasons to have sex at its most basic social level, 1. to get something, and 2. to exchange emotions. If you and your partner have mismatched views on sex, say you want sex and your partner doesn\u2019t, you need to ask yourself WHY you want sex. There are a variety of reasons:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Boost self-esteem<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Release stress or tension<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Feel loved or give love<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Make an emotional connection\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Feel powerful<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Feel complete<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And many more.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The best thing you can do, if you\u2019re even looking this question up, is to\u00a0take responsibility of your reasons to have or want to have sex. That way you can\u00a0share your reason with your partner in a mutually satisfying way.<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Why Does Sex Make Us Feel Good?<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To understand why sex makes us feel good we have to approach it first through a biological lens. The body releases 4 important mood-altering hormones: oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin, and epinephrine. You\u2019ve probably heard of some of these because they\u2019re directly related to happiness levels.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When analyzing brain activity during arousal we see that the limbic system, or the area that controls emotions, is activated. Arousal also has more visible effects, like increasing heartbeat and increasing sensitivity to certain areas of the body, like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/hot-spots-erogenous-zones-women\/\">erogenous zones<\/a>. Basically, the act of arousal prepares you for having sex.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/what-is-the-hormone-oxytocin\/\">Oxytocin<\/a> is released during orgasm. Oxytocin isn\u2019t just a \u201clove hormone\u201d that makes sex emotional, it also helps us establish trust and closeness with our partner.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/abs\/pii\/S0167268115000050\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">study<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> conducted on 3,800 adults in China discovered that those who were the happiest not only had frequent sex, but <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">quality<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> sex. So, what are the biggest factors that affect sexual satisfaction?<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Self-efficacy &amp; Communication<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Self-efficacy is the ability to achieve physical and psychological pleasure through intercourse. Some people argue that arousal is more prominent in traditional gender roles where a man is the sole provider for the family and intiates sex. However, a new <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1111\/jomf.12313\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">study<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> suggests that the frequency of sex is not affected by couples\u2019 views on gender roles. As expected, the difference lied in their initiation and achievement of sex, which also affects quality.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Couples who practice more traditional roles in gender and sex are likely to achieve high self-efficacy for males, who are the drivers of intimacy, and lower for women who may be inhibited from reaching their sexual desires. While there have been many jokes about men receiving more sex when participating in housework, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1177\/0003122412472340\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">research<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> suggests that gender display is more important than sex as a form of marital exchange.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/doi\/pdf\/10.1177\/0265407510386833\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">study<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> conducted by the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships found that the combination of open sexual communication, length of a relationship, and gender significantly increased relationship satisfaction, but not necessarily sexual satisfaction. Instead, sexual satisfaction mediated the relationship between open sexual communication and overall relationship satisfaction.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The most important thing to take away from this is that talking about our sexual likes and dislikes makes us have better sex, orgasm more, and be happier. Sounds like a win-win situation to us.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>March 20th marks International Day of Happiness, and we\u2019re dedicating the latest research to sex and happiness, that is, why sex makes us feel good and what we can do to have sex that makes us happy. What Does Sex Mean? We may ask ourselves, what does sex mean to a woman? What does sex mean to a man? What does sex mean to people at different ages? The most accurate answer is that sex means different things to different [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[925,924,17],"tags":[525,189,669],"coauthors":[947],"class_list":["post-33402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-committed","category-dating","category-sexual-health","tag-better-sex","tag-healthy-relationship","tag-sexual-health"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.8.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Effects of Happy Sex, A Natural Mood-Booster<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"March 20th marks International Happiness Day, and we\u2019re dedicating it to the latest research on sex and happiness.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Effects of Happy Sex, A Natural Mood-Booster\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"March 20th marks International Happiness Day, and we\u2019re dedicating it to the latest research on sex and happiness.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Volont\u00e9\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/LELO.Official\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-03-20T19:51:40+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-03-30T10:08:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/international-day-of-happiness.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"660\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"330\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Donna Turner\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Lelo_Official\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Lelo_Official\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Donna Turner\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/\",\"name\":\"The Effects of Happy Sex, A Natural Mood-Booster\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/international-day-of-happiness.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-03-20T19:51:40+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-03-30T10:08:36+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/ee7d40fffc3a3ad51f9cb3b4fa664198\"},\"description\":\"March 20th marks International Happiness Day, and we\u2019re dedicating it to the latest research on sex and happiness.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"\",\"contentUrl\":\"\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sex-and-internation-day-of-happiness\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Volonte\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Health\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.lelo.com\/blog\/sexual-health\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":3,\"name\":\"Want to Boost Your Mood? 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