Waiting Works: Couples Who Wait Report 22% Happier Marriages (and Better Sex!)

Brigham Young University recently conducted a large study of 2,035 married individuals, aiming to determine which factors contribute to a “happy” marriage. One of the questions on the survey was “When did you become sexual in this relationship?”. Interestingly, the study found that the longer the couple waited to have sex, the better their marriage was. Those couples who had waited all the way until marriage to have sex exhibited the highest advantages.

According to the study findings, couples who waited till marriage to have sex had the following advantages…

• 22% higher relationship stability
• 20% higher relationship satisfaction
• 15% better sex (“higher sexual quality of the relationship”)
• 12% better communication.

These are hugely significant findings to the waiting-till-marriage community. I don’t know about you, dear reader, but as somebody who’s waited for a long time hoping that it would lead to a great marriage…I’m pretty f’ing psyched about the above statistics. And you should be too.

Quotes from the Study Author

Professor Dean Busby, who conducted the research, naturally had a few things to say about these findings…

Regardless of religiosity, waiting helps the relationship form better communication processes, and these help improve long-term stability and relationship satisfaction.

There’s more to a relationship than sex, but we did find that those who waited longer were happier with the sexual aspect of their relationship.
I think [people who wait have better marriages] because they’ve learned to talk and have the skills to work with issues that come up

Other Cool Facts about the Study

• The study controlled for religion. As in, even in non-religious people, waiting on sex produced the same benefits regardless of religion (or lacked their of).
• The benefits are about half of the above numbers if the couples waited on sex for a little while, but not all the way until marriage.

Read the whole article by Dave McGinn at Globe and Mail here: Couples who wait report better sex lives.

What this Means for Those who Wait

Look, you’ve been told your whole life that you’re making a noble decision by waiting till marriage. People say “oh, good for you”. But secretly you’ve had to wonder: “Is it? Is it good for me? Will it really make me happier in the end?” Well, now you know: According to the results of this study, there’s a good chance that you aren’t crazy afterall. So congrats, dear reader. You made the right decision. Rest a little easier tonight that the future holds good fruit for the seeds you’ve planted by waiting.