Three’s a crowd or bonus?: College students’ threesome experiences

Abstract

Undergraduates (196) at a large southeastern university completed a 59 item Internet survey on threesome attitudes and behaviors. Fifteen percent of the sample reported having engaged in a threesome. Men evidenced more interest in having a threesome than women and persons most likely to report having had a threesome held hedonistic compared to relativistic or absolutist sexual values. The motivation for a threesome was primarily curiosity and the third person invited to join the couple in a threesome was most often a friend/acquaintance of the woman. The outcome of a threesome for the couple was primarily no effect with a about a fifth reporting negative outcomes and a similar percentage reporting positive outcomes. Finally, the event happened only once for 83% of the respondents who had a threesome. Symbolic interaction, operant learning, social learning, affective theory and feminist theory were used to interpret the data. Implications and limitations are identified.