美國人的性欲看來出了問題。

美國醫學期刊《性行為檔案》的新近研究顯示，前幾年美國成年人的性生活比上世紀90年代少，全年總次數減少了九次（從年均不到65次降至不足55次）。

這已經成為美國社會整體現象，不分性別、年齡、種族、工作，以及婚姻狀況。但在已婚或者與愛侶同居的美國人之中趨勢尤為突出。這類人前幾年一年內的性生活次數比本世紀初年度水平減少了16次。

即便性生活普遍減少，有伴侶的美國人也可能比沒有男女朋友的單身人士性生活多。該問題研究者、之一《我一代》（Generation Me）的作者簡·特文奇指出：“兩個人擦出感情火花自然比較容易發生性關系，但很顯然，如果一個人有關系穩定的伴侶，性生活會更頻繁。”

美國人性生活減少可以部分歸咎于人口因素：同居的美國人減少了（2014年，59%的美國人與伴侶同住，1986年還占比66%）。

但人口趨勢轉變并不是性生活減少的全部原因，這一下降趨勢始于2008年。對于為何美國人“性趣”下降，特文奇還有一種解釋：科技。更具體地說，是在本世紀第一個十年將近時，智能手機和流媒體服務興起。

特文奇解釋說：“現在的娛樂業娛樂性更強，幾乎有求必應。只要你想要，隨時都可以得到。數字硬盤錄像機（DVR）也更普及。”換句話說，我們可能忙于看電視節目，玩視頻游戲，通過Snapchat之類社交媒體和朋友聊天，無暇過性生活。

雖然目前這只是憑直覺得出的解釋，但確實很有說服力。特文奇說：“回想下過去十年發生了什么。”十年前，我們生活的環境還不像現在：移動設備屏幕隨處可見，社交媒體不斷更新換代，在視頻網站Hulu可以觀看長達180集的上世紀90年代大火美劇《黃金女郎》（The Golden Girls）。

由此看來，美國人只能犧牲性生活了。（財富中文網）

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譯者：pessy

審稿：夏林

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As a nation, our sex drive appears to be on the fritz.

American adults had less sex in the early 2010s than they did in the 1990s, to the tune of nine fewer times a year, according to new research published in Archives of Sexual Behavior. (That’s a drop from a yearly average in the low 60s, to one in the low 50s.)

This slump holds true regardless of gender, age, race, work or marital status, although it’s most precipitous for American who were married or living with a romantic partner, a group that reported having sex 16 fewer times per year in the early 2010s when compared to the early 2000s.

Even after this sharp decline, however, if you’re in relationship you’re still likely having more sex than your peers who aren’t. “Tinder supposedly makes it easier to have sex on tap, but it’s pretty well established that people with a steady partner tend to have sex more often,” says Jean Twenge, one of the study’s researchers and the author of Generation Me.

Part of this sexual drop off, then, can attributed to changing demographics: Fewer Americans are living with a significant other (in 2014, 59% of the population was living with a partner versus 66% in 1986).

But this shift doesn’t account for the entire decline, which started in earnest in 2008. Twenge has another theory on why we’re getting frisky less frequently: technology. More specifically, the rise of smartphones and streaming services, which began gaining real traction in the late 2000s.

“Entertainment is more entertaining now, it’s more on demand — you can access it anytime you want,” she says. “DVRs became more common right around that time, too.” In other words, we might be too busy binge watching shows, playing video games, and Snapchatting our friends to bother having sex.

While the explanation is just a hunch (for now), it’s a convincing one. “Think about what’s happened over the last 10 years,” Twenge says. A decade ago we were all living in a world without ubiquitous screens, constant social media updates, and all 180 episodes of The Golden Girls available to stream on Hulu.

And so, it seems, we resorted to sex.