Most of us have sexual fantasies that we wish were part of our sexual reality; however, few of us have ever shared these desires with our partners, let alone acted on them. Learning to communicate about our fantasies and desires is vital for maintaining happy and healthy relationships. Sexual communication has a number of benefits, from establishing greater intimacy and closeness to keeping passion alive. In this lecture and workshop, Dr. Justin Lehmiller, a Research Fellow at The Kinsey Institute, will break down the barriers to communicating about desire in a way that will help you to get more of what you want out of sex and to have a healthier and more satisfying relationship. In addition to offering practical tools for sharing and acting on sexual desires, we will explore scientifically-backed principles of relationship success more generally.
Learning Objectives:
- Describe 2 icebreakers and conversation starters for beginning a dialogue about sexual fantasy and desire
- Explain the potential risks and rewards of sharing and acting on one’s sexual fantasies
- Discuss factors that predict better/worse outcomes when it comes to acting on one’s sexual fantasies
- Describe the challenges of maintaining passion in a long-term relationship and how to overcome them
- Explain the nuanced association between sexual frequency and sexual satisfaction
Speaker Bio:
Dr. Justin J. Lehmiller received his Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Purdue University. He is a Research Fellow at The Kinsey Institute and author of the book Tell Me What You Want: The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life. Dr. Lehmiller is an award-winning educator, having been honored three times with the Certificate of Teaching Excellence from Harvard University, where he taught for several years. He is also a prolific researcher and scholar who has published more than 40 pieces of academic writing to date, including a textbook entitled The Psychology of Human Sexuality (now in its second edition) that is used in college classrooms around the world. Dr. Lehmiller’s research focuses on topics including casual sex, sexual fantasy, sexual health, and friends with benefits. His studies have appeared in all of the leading journals on human sexuality, including the Journal of Sex Research, Archives of Sexual Behavior, and The Journal of Sexual Medicine.
Dr. Lehmiller has run the popular blog Sex and Psychology since 2011, and it now receives several million page views per year. He has been interviewed by numerous media outlets, includingThe Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Boston Globe, CNN.com, The Atlantic, The Globe and Mail, and The Sunday Times. He has been named one of 5 “Sexperts” You Need to Follow on Twitter by Men’s Health and one of the “modern-day masters of sex” by Nerve. Dr. Lehmiller has appeared on several episodes of the television program Tabooon the National Geographic Channel and has been a guest on numerous podcast and radio shows, including the Savage Lovecast and the NPR programs Radio Times and Airtalk. He is a popular freelance writer, penning columns and op-eds for major publications, including Playboy, USA Today, VICE, Psychology Today, and New York Magazine. In addition, the articles he writes on Sex and Psychology have been syndicated on major websites, including Business Insider, Huffington Post, Men’s Health, and Thought Catalog