Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1893/23078
Appears in Collections:Psychology Journal Articles
Peer Review Status: Refereed
Title: Hormonal contraception use during relationship formation and sexual desire during pregnancy
Author(s): Cobey, Kelly D
Havlicek, Jan
Klapilova, Katerina
Roberts, S Craig
Contact Email: craig.roberts@stir.ac.uk
Keywords: Congruency hypothesis
Pregnancy
Oral contraception
Desire
Menstrual cycle
Issue Date: Nov-2016
Date Deposited: 19-Apr-2016
Citation: Cobey KD, Havlicek J, Klapilova K & Roberts SC (2016) Hormonal contraception use during relationship formation and sexual desire during pregnancy. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 45 (8), pp. 2117-2122. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-015-0662-6
Abstract: Women who are regularly cycling exhibit different partner preferences than those who use hormonal contraception. Preliminary evidence appears to suggest that during pregnancy women’s partner preferences also diverge from those prevalent while regularly cycling. This is consistent with the general assertion that women’s mate preferences are impacted by hormonal variation. During pregnancy, women’s preferences are thought to closely resemble those displayed by women who are using hormonal contraception. Here, based on this literature, we compared levels of sexual desire among pregnant women who met their partner while using hormonal contraception and pregnant women who met their partner while regularly cycling. We predicted that women who met their partner while using hormonal contraception would experience higher levels of in-pair sexual desire during pregnancy since these women will have partner preferences that more closely match those prevalent at the time of their partner choice. Our results provided support for the idea that previous contraceptive use/non-use may impact subsequent sexual desire for the partner during pregnancy. Pregnant women who met their partner while using hormonal contraception (N=37) were shown to have higher levels of in-pair sexual desire than those who met while regularly cycling (N=47). In contrast, levels of extra-pair desire were not related to previous use/non-use of hormonal contraception. These findings were robust when controlling for a number of relevant individual difference variables known to impact sexual desire. Our results contribute to our understanding of factors affecting relationship functioning during pregnancy.
DOI Link: 10.1007/s10508-015-0662-6
Rights: © The Author(s) 2015 This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://​creativecommons.​org/​licenses/​by/​4.​0/​), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
Licence URL(s): http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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