Sexual interactions (un)scripted: an exploration of consequential unscripted sexual interactions

ABSTRACT

This manuscript describes a study investigating consequential unscripted sexual interactions, their outcomes, and how interaction involvement and sexual communication satisfaction combined to influence perceptions of these unscripted exchanges. This approach fills an academic and pragmatic void in how sexual interactions are understood as extant scholarship largely frames sexual interactions as highly scripted episodes. Adults (N = 145) in the U.S. participated in an anonymous online survey. Respondents described important and meaningful conversations with a sexual partner during which they did not know what to say, what to do, or how to respond, and these narratives were reliably coded into nine categories using an a priori classification scheme. Topics produced differential outcomes, and both interaction involvement and sexual communication satisfaction made unique positive contributions to the consequences of unscripted sexual interactions.

KEYWORDS:

• Communication competence
• consequential unscripted interactions
• sexual interactions
• interaction involvement
• sexual communication satisfaction

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Because the number of sexual partners variable was positively (right) skewed (skew = 16.50) and included a statistical outlier, these scores were transformed using a square root transformation, which successfully maintained the representativeness of this sample and allowed for statistical analysis (M = 2.55, Mo = 1, Mdn = 2.45, SD = 1.37, Min = 1, Max = 9, skew = 1.43).

2. The transformed sexual partner variable was also included as a covariate in the analyses investigating interaction involvement, sexual communication satisfaction, and their relationships with consequential unscripted sexual interactions. The number of sexual partners produced no substantial change in average means, effect sizes, significance tests, or interpretation of the results.