Why aren’t young people having sex any more?
Over the past few decades, sex appears to have been on the decline among teenagers and young adults all over the world.
In the US in 2010, 12 per cent of 18 to 29-year-olds reported not having had sex in the past year, according to the General Social Survey, a long-running sociological survey. In 2024, that figure had doubled.
A similar decline in sexual activity among young people is occurring in high-income countries such as Australia and Germany. But it is most notable in Japan, with a recent review finding that around half of Japanese people remain sexually inexperienced through their mid-20s. This may explain why the number of deaths in Japan exceeded its births by almost 1 million in 2024, a “quiet emergency” according to the then prime minister Shigeru Ishiba. So, what is going on, and is it really an emergency?
Learn more: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2504177-why-arent-young-people-having-sex-any-more/
