RICHER women often have better access to education, jobs and wardrobes, and now the experts suggest that they are having much better sex lives than those at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder.
According to the recent analysis of the first Spanish Sexual Health Survey that was carried out by researchers at Barcelona’s Public Health Agency, socioeconomic factors do affect sexual satisfaction.
“People of a lower socioeconomic status claim to be less satisfied sexually, which especially applies to women who seem to be more influenced by these factors,” the study’s main author Dolores Ruiz was quoted as saying by Science Daily.
In the Jamaican culture, the ghetto woman has often been glorified as having more sexual prowess and skills than the one who lives uptown, and songs such as Slam by Moses ‘Beenie Man’ Davis have helped to cement this general belief in the minds of many.
However, Sociologist and Social Commentator Dr Orville Taylor says there is no empirical evidence to support this. In fact, he believes that if the same study was conducted in Jamaica, it would yield a similar result to what was obtained in Spain.
“One would imagine that if women have higher socioeconomic status, they would be in a better position to make decisions about their own sexuality and sexual agenda. A woman who has high economic status is likely to be able to dictate what she may or may not want to put up with. You find that women with low socio-economic status become less in control of their sexual destinies,” he said.
Of the belief that poorer women have better sex, he said there is no real evidence to support that.
“I remember some time ago, I was looking at something of the sort, and I find that at the lower socioeconomic levels, you tend to have less sexual tolerance and more taboos etc.”
The Spanish study found that those with lower socioeconomic status were less likely to use contraception and had more experiences of sexual abuse. They also had more challenges in getting access to the organisations that could provide help for them. On the other hand, wealthier women were found to have a greater awareness of their own sexual needs and greater control over their use of contraception.
It is believed that women with greater access to contraceptives generally have more satisfying sex lives because they don’t have to worry about unplanned pregnancies. The use of condoms, for example, also helps to minimise concerns about contracting a sexually transmitted disease, and so sex is more pleasurable.
Dr Taylor said one observation is that women and men from the lower classes do tend to portray themselves as being more sexually capable than those in the upper classes.
“Every time I talk about things relating to Jamaica, I think about the plantation heritage. On the plantation, men in particular were totally emasculated and one thing that they actually had to demonstrate that they were men was their capacity to perform sexually. Similarly, women on the plantation system didn’t have rights to their children and exclusive rights to their men etc, so one of the things that women had was their bodies which was the one thing they could control. Therefore, the whole experience placed a great premium on the ability to perform sexually, because that is the one equalising factor,” he said.
The sociologist agreed that a number of women in the high socioeconomic classes actually have difficulty balancing their jobs and maintaining healthy sex lives, but he believes a similar challenge exists for some women who have low-paying jobs and are therefore struggling financially.
“I think we should also recall that lower-class women who are effectively employed may have less free time and less leisure,” he said.
“Let’s say a woman is a security guard, for example. She is working 12 hours per day. A woman who is a household helper might only sleep with her husband on the weekend. A woman who is a police officer or a soldier works very long shifts.”
However, Dr Taylor was keen to point out that having a high socio-economic status doesn’t necessarily mean that a woman is independent of the influences of the man in her life. It could be, for example, that her husband is still earning more than her and uses this wealth to dictate to her, so that sexual intercourse is more of a chore rather than a mutually fulfilling experience.
Still he believes that once a woman is financially independent she has more talk about what goes in the bedroom and has more control over determining her sexual pleasure.
“Low economic status and poverty take away from your ability to enjoy sex, but at the same time, you might find yourself doing it as part of a relief and maybe with some frequency. But the kind of pleasure that you put into it, the type of creativity might not be there,” he said.
“When you have your bills to pay, when you are short on your payment, when you don’t know how you are going to send your children to school, when you are fretting, you don’t have the same type of appetite for sex. You are stressed out,” he added.
