They have sex with friends, acquaintances and people they're casually dating. Many have never been tested for H.I.V. or any other sexually transmitted disease, but they rarely use condoms. Who are they?
The irresponsible scoundrels are not teenagers but 50-something singles, according to the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior, one of the most comprehensive national sex studies in almost 20 years, carried out at the Center for Sexual Health Promotion at Indiana University.
It turns out that "friends with benefits" — a sexual partner who is "just a friend," and neither a soulmate nor a romantic interest — isn't just for teenagers and college students anymore, and maybe it never was. Young adults may have given the practice a new name, but it probably started during the '60s sexual revolution, when the middle-aged Americans of today were young themselves.
Most men over 50 do have sex with a partner. But almost 23 percent said their most recent sex was with a "friend" or a "new acquaintance."
Among women 50 and over, that figure was more than 13 percent. Those numbers don't surprise the experts.
" 'Friends with benefits' are uniquely suited to two groups of people — the young, who want to delay starting their life, and older people, who don't want to complicate it," said Pepper Schwartz, a sociology professor at theUniversity of Washington in Seattle who serves on the sexual health advisory council of Church & Dwight, which manufactures Trojan condoms and financed the sex survey. "People in the middle are building families and building a life — they need more than a friend, they need lifetime partners."
For older people who are casually having sex, "it's warm, it's nice, they care about each other, but no one is under the illusion this is a grand love," Dr. Schwartz said.
For middle-aged heterosexual women, limited expectations of a sexual relationship may be a function of demographics: Since women outlive men, there are simply fewer older men around, said Debby Herbenick, one of the study's authors and associate director of the Center for Sexual Health Promotion.
Young teenagers are far more responsible than older adults about using condoms, and they are not nearly as sexually active as many people think they are, the study found. Most past studies have estimated that half of all adolescents are sexually active, but those figures included 18- and 19-year-olds. Among those 14 to 17 years old, the new study found, fewer than one in four had ever had vaginal intercourse, and sexual activity increased gradually as they matured.
The vast majority of the sexually active boys — 80 percent of those aged 14 to 17 — indicated that they had used condoms the last time they had sex. "Teens have gotten a bad rap," said Dr. J. Dennis Fortenberry, a professor ofpediatrics at Indiana University School of Medicine and one of the authors.
Perhaps they can counsel their older counterparts. Only 25 percent of those 50 and over who were single or had a new sex partner or more than one partner in a year said they had used a condom the last time they had sex, the study found. Almost 40 percent had never been tested for H.I.V., and a significant number didn't know the sexual history of their partners.
Experts say many reasons could account for this behavior. Many older singles have spent much of their adult lives in long-term committed relationships, and may think of H.I.V. and AIDS as a concern of young people. They haven't been targeted by public health messages urging condom use, and there's no parental figure handing out condoms along with the car keys on a Saturday night. Older men may also worry that condoms cause erectile problems, Dr. Herbenick said.
And they may just have gotten out of the habit, Dr. Herbenick said. "They may just be thinking, 'Gosh, it's been 20 years since I used a condom, I'm not going to start again.' "
