Sexual Communication: Scholarly vs. Popular Media
Joshua Lee
Human Sexuality CHFD220
American Military University
Prof. Deris

Abstract
This paper is to show two different views of sexual communication. The first view is through a scholarly journal article called Education, Communication and Wellbeing: An Application to Sexual Satisfaction by Helmut Rainer and Ian Smith. The second view is through popular media article found in Shape magazine called Want Better Sex? Speak Up! by Jennipher Walters. Each article is written and compressed from research that was conducted. Both articles will be explained, and then the two articles will be compared to each other.

In the article, Education, Communication and Wellbeing: An Application to Sexual Satisfaction by Helmut Rainer and Ian Smith, a study is performed to investigate empirically the determinants of communication between sexual partners and the consequences in the specific context of sexual satisfaction. “Sexual satisfaction is a topic that is under-researched by economists despite the limited existing evidence suggesting that it is highly salient in the perceived quality of many intimate relationships and that this is an important contributor to overall personal happiness”(Rainer, 2012). In a worldwide study from 29 different counties conducted by Laumann et al (2006), they were about report that there was a strong correlation between the sexual wellbeing and both the relational satisfaction and basic happiness in general. The research method used for this observation was in the form of a survey. The surveys was composed in order to gather data to find an evaluation of one’s relationship, paying particular attention to four selected area’s which include schooling (education), sexual satisfaction, information acquisition and relationship duration. The ages of the people that conducted this study range in groups from 15-17, 25-27, and 35-37 years old during the time the data was collected for the study. There was a total 12,403 people who were randomly selected who completed this survey. “The level of education is measured in continuous form as years of education for those who are not currently in school for both the respondent and their partner” (Rainer, 2012). The survey focused on the educational background and the different sexual outcomes.
Sexual satisfaction was measured through questions ordered based on a response scale. Specified questions looking for detailed answers bases on a 0 -10 rating scale. Questions like “All in all, how satisfied are you with your sex life?” With the respondent giving a rate for each question answered. 0 equals a thought of very dissatisfied and all the way to ten being highly satisfied.
“Information acquisition uses the respondent’s self-reported disposition towards listening to and questioning the partner” (Rainer, 2012). Another way to look at information acquisition is to think of it as sexual partners preferences. This part of the survey each survey taker was asked simple behavioral questions, with each surveyor answering questions, and giving a 0-5 rating based on 0(not often) to 5(very often). The questions were based on an example and the surveyor would rate how often they felt they felt a certain way or expressed a certain trait.
The relationship duration was based on measuring the months since the beginning of the partnership and this includes all people that are in a living to together relationship, not just married but also couples that co-reside.
There were a total of six hypotheses for this study. Those hypotheses were to claim that there is a positive association between education and information acquisition effort, there is also a positive association between a partner’s education and information acquisition effort, information acquisition effort is increasing in the level of uncertainty, education is positively related to sexual satisfaction through its effects on information