The French have a certain reputation when it comes to the vie d’amour. But the latest national study on the country’s sexual behaviour may offer a reason to rethink.
According to findings from the National Institute of Health and Medical Research, the age at which French people are having sex for the first time is increasing.
The median age of first sexual intercourse, defined as the age at which half the population lost their virginity, was 17.3 in 2010.
The latest study of 31,518 people found that as of 2023, the median age at which French women lost their virginity was 18.2, and 17.7 for men.
The trend appears to be a reversal of the increasingly laissez-faire approach of French society in the second half of the last century.
The age at which women lost their virginity decreased by almost three years between the early 1960s and the mid-2000s (20.1 years compared with 17.3 years) and by a year and a half for men (18.8 years compared with 17.3 years).
The study suggests all is not lost for the reputation of the French lover, memorably burnished by the likes of the singer-songwriter Serge Gainsbourg and the erotic literature of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos, author of Les Liaisons dangereuses. The number of sexual partners over a lifetime is on the increase in France.
The average number of partners among women aged 18-69 who have had sex was 3.4 in 1992 but rose to 4.5 in 2006 and 7.9 in 2023.
For men, these figures were stable between 1992 and 2006 (11.2 and 11.9 respectively) but increased significantly to an average of 16.4 partners in 2023.
But, peel back the figures, and the trend around actual sexual activity is distinctly downwards: in 1992, 86.4% of women aged 18-69 said they had had sexual intercourse in the past year. That figure dipped to 82.9% in 2006 and it stood at 77.2% in 2023. Among men, the figure dropped from 92.1% in 1992 to 89.1% in 2006 and 81.6% in 2023.
The study’s authors said the trends showed a “contemporary paradox of sexuality” characterised by “greater diversity at the same time as a lower intensity”.
“The reasons for these trends are multiple. First of all, it should be noted that women and men under 69 in France are less likely to be in a relationship today than in previous decades,” they said.
“Periods without a stable partner are therefore more numerous in 2023 than in the past. The development of sexuality in digital spaces also contributes, particularly among the youngest, to transforming the experience of sexuality, which is no longer experienced solely in physical space but also in digital space.”
They added: “Finally, other studies show that the Covid-19 pandemic, and in particular the periods of confinement, have contributed to altering the mental health of the youngest in the long term, which may have changed their expectations regarding sexuality.”
The study suggests this trend has also been observed in Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the US.
The first study of French sexuality in the series was conducted in 1970 and the latest report was five years in the making and covers mainland France and the overseas territories of Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guiana and Réunion.
There have been no similar mass studies in the UK, but a survey published in the Journal of Sex Research last year suggested the number of British teenagers having their first sexual experience by the age of 15 had declined by up to a third in the past decade. The study found 23.6% of British girls reported having had sex by the age of 15, compared with 22.8% of boys.
