WHOOP Podcast - Sex, sleep, and performance: what WHOOP data reveals about sexual activity

Episode Date: February 16, 2022

This week’s episode is all about sex. Our VP or Performance, Kristen Holmes, sits down with Dr. Michele Lastella, a researcher in sleep, sexual activity, and athletic performance, for an in-depth discussion on how sexual activity plays a role in your sleep quality, your physiology, and your emotional wellbeing. Plus, we also reveal the latest WHOOP insights on sexual activity and masturbation. Kristen and Dr. Lastella discuss how sex helps you be present (5:01), the hormonal response triggered in our bodies (6:26), how sex can reduce sleep latency (8:48), sleep and libido (13:01), sex as a health promoting behavior (16:50), new WHOOP sex and masturbation data (21:53), how sex habits change as we age (23:02), what the research says about sex with your regular partner (24:45), the role sex plays in purpose (27:52), which U.S. states report the most sex on WHOOP (30:46), and how events like Valentine's Day and the Super Bowl change sex behaviors (35:44). Support the showFollow WHOOP: www.whoop.com Trial WHOOP for Free Instagram TikTok YouTube X Facebook LinkedIn Follow Will Ahmed: Instagram X LinkedIn Follow Kristen Holmes: Instagram LinkedIn Follow Emily Capodilupo: LinkedIn

What's up, folks? Welcome back to the WOOP podcast, where we sit down with the very best athlete, scientists, experts, and more to learn what the best in the world are doing to perform at their peak. I'm your host, Will Ahmed, founder and CEO of Woop, where we're on a mission to unlock human performance. We've got an awesome episode this week all about sex. That's right. But before we get to that, a reminder, you can get 15% off a Woop member. If you use the code will, that's WI-L, check us out at whoop.com. You get the Woop 4.0.

You get everything related to sleep, recovery, strain data. It is the best health monitor on the market. Okay, this week's episode, all about sex. We just followed Valentine's Day earlier this week. And our VP of Performance, Kristen Holmes, sits down with Dr. Michaela Lestella, a researcher in sleep, sexual. activity and athletic performance. They talk about how sexual activity plays a role in your sleep quality, your physiology, and your emotional well-being. Plus, they dive into new whoop data

and what that says about sex and masturbation. Dr. Lestella is a true expert in this field, with one of his primary areas of research focusing specifically on the relationship between sex and sleep. He's authored over 60 papers covering sexual activity, sleep, recovery, sport psychology, and athletic performance. His 2019 study found that both men and women perceive that they fall asleep quicker and sleep better after orgasm with a partner or alone. Christian and Dr. Lestella discuss what happens physiologically and psychologically during and after sex, what sleep latency is and how sex can reduce it, the role sexual activity plays in longevity, the differences between sex with a partner versus masturbation,

and how libido changes over time and why sleep might be the key to keeping your drive higher. They also go deep on which age groups have the most sex on whoop, which states report the most sex, and how events like the Super Bowl and Valentine's Day affect the instances of reported sexual activity on whoop. Some of this data might surprise you, so stay tuned. And of course, just know that all of this data is completely de-identified and aggregated. so all privacy is maintained. Okay, without further ado, here are Kristen Holmes and Dr. Michaela Lestella. Dr. Lestella, welcome.

Hey, Kristen, how are you? Well, thanks. Gosh, it's been like two years, exactly, since I think we first met. Yeah, I think it has. Yeah, you're in Adelaide, and a lot's happened since then, hasn't it? I was just catching up on just your bio, and you are just prolific. So I think just to tee up the conversation, and just folks should know, you know, that you have, I think, over 50 peer-reviewed publications related to all sorts of topics related to human

performance, sleep, sex, recovery, travel, fatigue, jet lag, psychological well-being, and performance. So it just really runs the gamut. So there's just tons and tons of stuff that we could actually talk about. But today, we are going to focus on sex behavior and some of the research that you've done and then some of the other research that's already out there. And we also are going to leverage your deep knowledge of just human physiology and human behavior to dig into unpublished Woop sex and masturbation data. So I suppose, you know, we'll editorialize a bit in terms of what those data might mean,

but it'll be super fun, I think, to dig into it. And I know our members are dying to know what we found in the data. So super excited to chat about it. Really looking forward to obviously Woop's doing a fantastic job. So huge amount of members. and I think it's just continuing to grow, so there's more data just being collected. So I think, you know, when we consider this topic, you know, sex is definitely more than just reproductive behavior or, you know, the potential for egg fertilization.

I think both sex and masturbation play actually key roles in our sleep quality and our potentially our longevity and really our overall health. Don't overstate it, but I think that, you know, it does play a key role. And that's really what I'd love to unpack. Before we kind of dig into a lot of those details, would love to just talk through just kind of an overview of like what's actually happening in the brain and body during sex and masturbation. And then we can maybe dig into some of the physiological features associated with, you know, ejaculation and orgasm. I think one of the most

important things to remember with, I guess, sexual activity is that it's a big part of our lives from, you know, a very young age to, to, you know, even as we've seen through the data that we were talking about before, up until, you know, 60, 70, even 80 potentially. So it plays a big part of our lives. And I think one of the things to remember is that, you know, we are actually present when we're engaging in sexual activity. So it enables the brain to kind of go into a present state. So I think that's really important to remember because a lot of talk about mental well-being these days is about being, you know, being present and mindful. So I think that's important apart from all the physiological things that happen. I think that's also something that's

really important to consider. And just to talk about that for a second, because I know, you know, just being an athlete and playing sports, you know, whenever I feel my best, it's certainly when I'm not thinking about the past or the future. So it's kind of the same principle, right? Like you are in a state where you are just simply less anxious when you're able to really be engaged in the moment. I think as we both know, as, you know, just the backgrounds in psychology, like that is a skill actually that we train. It's very easy to talk about. Sometimes it's easy to talk about. But sometimes, You know, when there's pressure and things like that, also you can get in your mind. So, yeah, so it's interesting.

And we're not sex therapists, obviously, but I think we can probably safely say that the more present you are during sex, probably the better it's going to go. Definitely agree with that, yes. So let's talk a little bit about what's happening physiologically. So, you know, we've got increases in heart rate. You know, we can just kind of go down the laundry list of like what we would expect to see from a hurry perspective. I mean, the hurry variability, autonomic nervous system. Yeah, so from what we see from the literature is that, you know, engaging in sexual activity and particularly when we orgasm, we have a release or a cocktail of release of different hormones

such as oxytocin. So oxytocin tends to increase. Prolactin also tends to increase. It's essentially that sexual satisfaction hormone. Also, you have a reduction in cortisol, which then can cause a reduction in stress. So I think those kind of hormones are really, really important. You know, I guess I always jump to sleep because I'm a sleep expert, but looking at those kind of hormones and, you know, reducing our sleep latency is probably one of the reasons or one

of the mechanisms why it helps promote sleep onset latency or how quickly we fall asleep. So sorry, my mind always goes there, but. Yeah, no, I mean, that's probably when we think about, you know, serotonin. For example, the release of serotonin after orgasm, I mean, that's the molecule that's going to help us feel sleepy. So I think when we feel sleepy after, you know, sex, that is exactly why is because we're releasing that molecule that is actually going to prompt is a precursor to melatonin essentially. And I don't know the answer to this, but there is a question that started to come up once I've started to do a little bit of research on this and actually look at other literature

is how long does that, I guess, euphoric state last after orgasm? And I don't actually know the answer, but I'm sure all your members and people listening in might actually chime in on this or other experts. But, you know, how long does that kind of euphoric state lasts in order to help our sleep onset? So that's one of the questions that I really would like to find out over the next few years. Yeah. And just explain, you know, for our listeners who might not be familiar with the term sleep onset latency, if you can just kind of explain what that is and why that's important and how that changes, you know, with partner sex versus sex, you know, without a partner? Yeah. So in terms of sleep onset latency, or if you ever hear I say sleep latency,

it's basically the duration it takes to fall asleep. So on average, it should take the general population about 20 minutes to fall asleep, sometimes 20 to 30. If it's longer than 30 minutes, we typically advise, I guess, you know, people to maybe get up and have a little bit of walk around and not try force, force the sleep situation. So whenever you hear us talk about sleep latency, it's essentially how quickly you can fall asleep. So, and some of the data that we've collected through some surveys is essentially saying that when people are engaging in sex, that includes an orgasm, they're reporting that their sleep latencies are shorter than their usual. So that's one of the main things we found in that survey in 2019. Without an orgasm, presumably you're not releasing

this cocktail of hormones. Is that correct? Yes, essentially you're not releasing. It's not to say that you're not emotionally satisfied, but when we did some analysis between males and females, typically what we found was that when there was no orgasm, then this effect was reduced in terms of sleep latency and sleep quality. So one of the main points of the paper is the orgasm is key. And we did this because we were trying to promote, I guess, you know, getting rid of screen time or substituting screen time for playtime, because obviously smart devices are such a massive part of our lives. And I was just trying to, you know, move away from that situation. Get the tech out of the bedroom.

Promoting playtime instead of screen time. Yeah, I mean, I think when we consider, you know, the mental health issues that exist, there must be some sort of potential relationship, I would say, between maybe the decrease in sexual activity, you know, in favor of just being on screens, you know, in bed. I don't know, it has a different poll than maybe a good book, you know. It's a different argument, isn't it? It's a different argument because when people are posting a photo and then someone's liking their photo, then they're getting that shot of dopamine. It almost becomes addictive. So it's one of those ones where it's, what's actually better for you as an individual as a whole? And I definitely

would say that, you know, engaging in more sex than spending time on your phone or engaging with your partner as opposed to spending more time on your phone is probably the much better option. And we know from the literature about sex and all the health benefits that's associated with sex, you know, so it's, yeah, for me, it's a no-brainer. And sometimes we get trapped into a certain pattern, even, you know, within relationships. Yeah, I mean, I think it's valuable to like look at, you know, just where your dopamine hits are actually coming from. You know, I mean, I think as it relates specifically to sex, like pornography, for example, you know, like that's a different kind of dopamine hit that's, you know, not as beneficial,

I think we can say from the literature. Yeah, I'm actually not overly familiar with that kind of literature. But, you know, if we look at it at a logical level, I think experiencing something versus a virtual or just watching a screen, I feel like it'll be different. And there is some stuff related to masturbation versus actual sexual activity and talking about there's an association between masturbation and depression as opposed to just sex activity with a partner. But the main problem, I think, is that some of this literature is now, you know, a little bit older. So this is why I think I'm trying to break down the taboo about, you know, sexual activity research in sleep in particular because whenever we submit something to an ethics, committee or anything like that, it's quite difficult to get passed. You know, imagine getting

12 participants in a lab and getting them to engage in sexual activity. Like, it's just, it just doesn't happen in our modern society. So that's why things like, you know, activity trackers like, whoop, you know, portable polycinography type things. Like, that's why they're so, they're so valuable now. That's the direction we need to move in. So, and I think we are. We definitely are. Michael, let's talk about libido and how it, and it may be some of the reasons why it might change as you age. And I think that it's potentially similar origins for probably men and women and that there's a reduction in testosterone, reductions or changes in estrogen, and there's things happening hormonally that are causing shifts. But I think there are some really kind of proven

things that we can do to mitigate some of the effects of, or how drastic those effects are happening, and that might have a downstream effect to our sexual desire and our drive. What would you kind of hypothesize is kind of happening there. Well, if you look at libido changes over the lifespan, obviously it does reduce and we do know that. But also, like I say all the time from a sleep perspective, one thing that we know is that our sleep actually declines as we get older or people say that they need less sleep, which is not, I don't, I'm not so convinced by that argument, but sleep does change as we get older, but also, you know, depending on the age span we're looking at, because sometimes, you know, when people are in their 40s, 50s, they're actively working

and they're working a lot and they're trying to pay all the bills and all the demands of our society. So naturally, libido will maybe take, you know, a backseat in that regard. So I would definitely say that, you know, the more we talk, the more projects that come up in my mind, but are definitely... I know, right? Like, it was just like an endless amount of research. I'm like, there's somebody unknowns. It's just too much. And this is why, I promote sleep so much. You've got to make sleep a priority. So I'm sure if we looked at some of the literature or even conducted a study looking at libido over the lifespan and looking at sleep, there would be definitely a correlation there. The only thing is the cause and effect

situation in terms of a research project over a long period of time is quite difficult. But there's a reason why libido changes, but also there is sleep changes. So there's definitely a strong relationship, I would say there. So if you want to increase your libido, and get more sleep. Actually, there was a study actually showed with women that got one more hour sleep per night were 1.5 times, I believe, more likely to engage in sex activity the next day. I mean, energy, you know, and I think that's a huge piece of it, right? Like, you know, do I actually have the energy? And I think drive. You know, I think there's, you know, things that, you know, are turning on versus turning off, you know, when we're just, when we're sleep deprived. And I think

when we're sleep deprived, obviously our body is having to compensate in ways and, you know, it's allocating resources just to kind of get you back to neutral. It's just not a lot left in the tank, you know, so. 100%. You said it beautifully there. It's interesting when we look at the folks who are logging and tracking sexual activity on whoop, the 60 plus is actually really active. Yeah.

Which is great. And 20 to 29 is really active. But that middle kind of range is a little bit less. and child rearing, you know, demands to your point, like, you know, you're trying to work your way up the corporate ladder and, you know, you just get all these kind of, you know, demands on your time. Actually, when you put it like that, it's definitely like, that's what happens, but it's also a cause for concern if that makes sense because those essentially are probably the best years of your life and you're kind of just grinding past those years as opposed to actually appreciating that time you have. So that's, yeah, it's actually, you're ticking some alarm bells. off there in terms of, you know, for any, any, any members or anyone watching, it's probably the time where you might need to actually plan a little bit and have that time for yourself

and your partner and your family. And, yeah, that's, that's a, that's an important topic. How critical is sex, you know, during that time from where you are kind of at your prime? If we're not having sex, do you think that we age faster, for example? Like, what is, is there any benefit or, you know, just having sex kind of means you're staying biologically relevant, you know, like that you can pre-produce. Like, you know, I just wonder what the literature says about any of those relationships. You know, talking about prime is when we saw those stats with the, with the whoop was, so from 20 to 29 was the most active participants in terms of sex.

So I think it's, yeah, to stay, what did you call it, biologically relevant? I think, I just made that up. Yeah, I like it. Yeah, I think that's important, obviously. And if you're not, then potentially you're missing out on all the other kind of health benefits that comes with sex as well. So I think it's important to channel. Well, let's talk a little bit more about sex habits. You know, we've been kind of teasing that a little bit across the WOOP population.

You know, definitely in my time at WOOP, you know, I've worked with a lot of elite level athletes and they're always asking, can I have sex before the game? A million dollar question. Right? Like, everyone is really concerned about that. Like, is it helping my recovery? Is it hurting my recovery? You know, these are people who are, you know, really at the margins trying to figure out, okay, what, you know, how is this actually impacting me and they want to see the data.

The one percent is. Yeah, I know. But we definitely get this. And, you know, is, you know, differences between, you know, sex with a partner versus masturbation versus, you know, just all of these, you know, day versus night. And now with the book journal, people at an individual level can start to unpack this for themselves and start to see, you know, the potential relationships between, you know, different times during the day.

and how that might impact recovery and their sleep. And about an aggregate kind of level is obviously what we're talking about here. And obviously there's very little data on this topic at all. It's because people are so scared to touch it, especially like sports coaches and things like that because I've been saying that whole myth about building the testosterone before a big fighter or for anything like that. So you were talking about one study that actually debunked it a little bit

in terms of having sex before 10, was it? 10 hours before performance. It actually showed no negative impact on performance output. Yeah. So this is a study, sex and performance. This is a clinical trial that was published in, I think, 2000 Journal of Sports Medicine, Physical Fitness. And they showed that, yes, sexual activity had no detrimental influence on maximal workload achieved on the athlete's mental concentration. So that was good. Regardless of when they had sex. So it did not impact to mental concentration, but the higher post-effort heart rate values after maximal stress test on the morning of sexual intercourse suggests that the recovery capacity of athlete

could be affected if the sexual intercourse happens two hours prior to competition event. So no sex with two hours before a big game, big fire, whatever performance that you're trying to do. Exactly. And they saw like if you were to leave 10 hours prior to you know your meat match it was is only eight dudes in the study but there there are five field two weightlifting and then i think uh uh track and field maybe so i think it was like a combination of like basketball and baseball and it was eight people but across three different types of disciplines um but they saw that you know no if they were having sex 10 hours prior to their competition there was absolutely no effect at all it's great it's great to hear and it's great to

you know obviously promote that that research as well i think the main thing is before a big performance it's you know what kind of sexual activity are you engaging in do you know what I mean is is it is it long is it multiple or is it just you know quick and short if that if that makes sense because the longer you go into the night then the less hours of sleep you're obtaining so the less hours sleep you're obtaining then the more likely you're heading into a competition one sleep deprived so I feel like the sleep deprivation or sleep restriction will have a greater impact than the actual sexual activity itself. So I think that's one thing to be mindful for anyone listening in is, you know, not engaging in sexual activity like in the early hours of the morning because

it's just going to delay how much sleep you obtain and it's going to impact, one, how you feel the next day and two, how you perform the next day. So I think there is a subjective component to that though. That's really important. Sometimes like the feeling of connection and, you know, just engaging with your partner in that way and feeling close, like that can actually maybe offset some of the deleterious and, you know, effects of maybe not getting exactly the amount of sleep that you need. Oh, definitely. And it's also your perception on, you know, what, what impact sleep has before your performance. I think there was an Olympic pole volta. I forget her name, but she was so paranoid about not winning gold that what she did, because she never

sleeps before big events. So what she did was actually stayed up all night, did a one-night, performed her personal best the morning where she didn't sleep at all. So she knew going into that competition that she was actually going to be able to perform, even if she didn't sleep. So some of the stuff with the sleep and performance literature shows that, you know, you have enough resources to deliver like a maximal output for your next day. So that's just something to be mindful. Belief effects.

Oh, that, yeah, not even considering the belief effects. So if you add that even better. Yeah, exactly. Okay, so let's just kind of go down the population just so people get like a sense of what's actually happening within our data sets. So gender differences. Male and female members record similar amounts of sex in the Whoop Journal. So very tiny difference between men and women, which is kind of cool to see. Male members record almost double masturbation using Whoop Journal.

So men are at 42% and women are at 23.8. 5%, which is not surprising. Do you want to comment on just those differences? I think there's a few things to consider with that is, obviously, it doesn't really surprise me, but also, you know, how willing people are to report that as well. So maybe males have got no problems, you know, I guess reporting that and recording on their diaries, as opposed to maybe females. I mean, I think there's probably some physiological reasons, I think drive for

women maybe is a little different than men just typically like when do you think about testosterone and I think too like masturbation for men seems to be just a kind of stress relief tactic yeah definitely I'm not I'm not overly familiar with the literature on that but I think you'd be you'd be you be spot on there looking at age ranges so 20 to 29 age rates records the most sex as we said which is 10% more than the next closest group which is the 60 plus yeah which was at 21.2%. And then masturbation drops sharply with age, 60-year-olds reporting 28% less masturbation than 20 to 29-year-olds. So not surprising. And then looking at habits and frequency, weekdays versus weekends, members have 50% more sex on the weekends. Not too surprising.

Yeah, I think with the weekends, we've got obviously more time to do things, you know. People obviously go out and party and things like that. depending on what age bracket you're talking about, but also people spend more time in bed on the weekends and they will have more time with their partners on the weekend. So that's great. So maybe we should spend more time in bed during the week as opposed to just the weekend.

And they will have more sex. Yeah, so you can have maybe, you know, the Wednesday hump day. It might be the extra one where you get more sleep and more sex. Why not? We talked a little bit about sex and its impact on sleep. You talked about sleep onset latency and what you've seen in some of the research that you've done there.

What else do you feel like folks need to know about sex and sleep? One of the main things is that engaging in sex activity does not disrupt your sleep in any way. So that's the main thing people need to know. If anything, you know, we've hypothesized with some of my research is that it actually helps promote sleep in terms of, you know, reducing how long it takes to fall asleep, but also the overall sleep quality or the perceptions. at least of sleep quality. And some of the,

some new research we've found with relationship type and, and sexual activity is that regular partners or, you know, coupled partners, have a greater, I guess, sleep satisfaction scores. They also report emotional satisfaction to be higher.

So that also has an indirect on, on their sleep quality. So in, in terms of that, that's definitely something that people need to consider is, is, you know, who's your partner? Are you emotionally satisfied within the relationship? Which then obviously results to being physically satisfied and can help obviously your sleep.

That's something that people need to know is that the type of relationship, engaging in sex, can help your sleep. But it definitely does not have a negative effect on your sleep. Yeah, that's really, I think, exciting and important thing for folks to recognize. I think, too, you hit on it, you know, just how sex actually impacts, like, our mental health, too. there seems to be quite a virtuous cycle, you know, in terms of sleep and sex and sleep gives you the energy to be able to be in a position where you want to connect with your partner and have the, you know, because they're, you know, having sex itself releases a lot of hormones related to emotions that are super positive and that both generally bode well for our mood

as we're kind of seeing in terms of people's subjective perceptions of sex on, on their sleep, but just their kind of overall feelings. If anyone wants to have a look at a really good paper, there's a researcher Stuart Brody who's prolific in the health benefits of sex activity and he does touch on some sleep stuff and that's kind of how I started to generate some of my ideas. But if anyone wants to look him up or we can add it in the comments below, he's done some really good stuff with the health benefits of sex, definitely. Yeah, I think we were talking earlier too about Michael Royson's research too. just a big study did. It was a while ago, but looking at the relationship between, you know, sex and longevity. And just, you know, for all the kind of reasons we've been circling around, just the reduction in stress and anxiety and how sex can relax us potentially and lead to better

sleep, enhancing intimacy, obviously, and just helping our personal relationships. So again, I think to your point, there's no real kind of study that is, you know, cause and effect. But between good sex and longevity? There was one study, but I think the author was Davy and colleagues, and I think it was in 97, they looked at an English sample and people that engaged in sex twice a week versus less than once a month. So the people that engaged in sex less than once a month had like a death rate times two or something along those lines.

So like obviously looking at mortality over a long span. Again, not causation, but there is, there was definitely, they were definitely relating that. So it's just one factor, but, you know, an interesting one, nonetheless. You know, I think one of the really cool things that we've seen in the Woop data is that people are more likely to report a sense of purpose after sex. So when you look, I know, when you look at like literally the three most important psychological needs we have as human beings, purpose, like autonomy, relatedness, I would say, and self-affecacy. maybe four. You know, obviously purpose is at the kind of very tippy top. So to kind of see that, you know, bubble up as a strong relationship, I think is so cool. I think great question. Great question as well. Like, you know, do you feel a sense of purpose? So I guess when people are in a

negative state of mind, they're going to say no, you know, like I don't. But, but if you're saying yes, then you're getting, that's just, that's automatically giving you a sense of feedback when you're responding yes to that or a percentage to that because, yeah, I do. Oh, actually, Wow, even more. So it can promote your mental well-being even further by just responding to that question with a yes. Michaela, looking at the member population, we found that sex that occurred early in the day, had an increase, a very small increase, but an increase nonetheless on recovery as compared

to sex that occurred close to bedtime. Yeah, when I saw that, I was a little bit like, oh, debunked my whole idea. As well as Brodies or Brisset, all those ones. authors that I've been kind of following for a little bit. So I was like, okay, that's interesting now. I was like, okay, now we need to find out more. So the fact that sex that was engaged in earlier in the day had was, I think it was one percent better than the ones that were I think within a shorter period towards bed. So yeah, closer to bed, yeah. To be honest with you, I don't actually have an answer for that. The only thing I can think of is what other factors are they

engaging in the day or are they in a better overall state or you know that day for example i mean i think if you can have sex during the day something good is happening and you're like you're not working or you're both home or whatever it is you know you're obviously relaxed so you're not coming home from work stressed or coming from training or anything like that it's it's it's a consistent smooth day which is then obviously enabling you to have a nice wind down routine before you can go to bed that night. So that's my explanation for that finding. Yeah, I mean, we don't know, right?

But it's kind of interesting. I think that's why science is so important because just having one study or just having two or three studies, it's not, it can't be gospel, if that makes sense. It can't be set in stone. We need to. And this is why, you know,

the contributions to the tech is phenomenal because we're continuing to add to the literature. And that's what, I guess, my job as a researcher is to add to the literature, to add to what's being, what we're finding. What are some of the challenges doing research? I mean, it's, it's, sex research is really hard. Yeah. I think, I think when you combine sex and sleep research, it's, it just, it causes a lot of problems in terms of when you're going to an ethics committee. I think I touched on it earlier. So having people engage in sex within a sleep lab and then obviously watching them is, is probably never going to get ethics permission. So automatically, in my mind, I'm like,

I'm not even going to bother asking an ethics committee to conduct such research. There's other things like, you know, when you're examining some of those hormones we were talking about earlier, how do you do that straight after sex? And then try and get people to fall asleep. So imagine if you're trying to take some bloods after someone's finished having sex,

while they've got a full set of polycinography attached to their head, like that in itself or the needle in itself or taking the bloods or having electrodes is probably going to deter any sort of, you know, euphoric effects that it's going to have on sleep. So that's one of the main challenges. The observation, obviously, within our labs with our cameras and things like that. But on the positive, because I always like to look at the positive, is that we've got such great technology now,

And we can start to examine sleep and sex in a more objective manner. You mentioned about heart rate, faster heart rate, after, you know, looking at orgasm, looking at objective sleep, you know, stages of sleep, and also looking at sleep over time, which is great, you know. So, you know, comparing a night when you have sex, compared to when you don't have sex, compared to when you have an orgasm, and looking at those groups, I think it's really, really, I guess, at the forefront, now because we can do that because the technology is allowing us to do that and we're not just

relying on perceptions so perception serves one purpose but also the objective data is actually what people you know want to know but for me it's it's all about promoting sleep and if sexism means to do that then then let's go for it because there's so many i guess pharmacological approaches to treating sleep which i like to take a kind of a non-pharmological approach and using sex as a sleep promoting aid. It's not going to solve all the problems, but if it can help a small percentage of people that are struggling to sleep, then why not? Let's do that instead of giving them a pill.

So that's essentially what I've been trying to do and break down over the last few years. Yeah, and I think if we can get people sleeping better, we people are going to mentally be in a better spot and physically be in a good spot. And I think we just kick off a nice virtuous cycle. Yeah, absolutely. Couldn't agree more. So state-level data is absolutely fascinating when we look at the top three states that are having sex. Utah comes in number one at 20.7%.

And in a close second, my willing to me is Wyoming. And then third is Oklahoma at 19.6%. The bottom three states, Vermont, at 15.9%, Minnesota at 16.4%, and South Dakota. at 16.6%. So all those are very cold states. I don't know if that has anything to do with it. Yeah, I was about to ask. I was about to ask, do you have any ideas as to why,

or you can explain to an Australian why certain states? I wish I had something kind of insightful to add to that. I literally, it's shocking to me. So the colder states were engaging in less sex or reporting less six? I wouldn't say, I mean, Utah is cold and Wyoming is cold. Yeah, I mean, these are not southern. neither the top nor the bottom, there's really no southern states represented, which, I don't know, it's kind of, they're in the middle somewhere.

Obviously, the southern states are obviously warmer. What about in the summertime? We had, I think, June and July, the months where there is the most sex, summertime, vacation, people take vacation. More time, more time, more time, more sleep, more time. Time, time, I know. It all comes back to sleep. Masturbation, state-level data.

We've got Arkansas coming in at number. number one, reporting 40.1%. Delaware, 38.5. And then Montana, coming in at third, 38.2%. The bottom three states. So the least masturbation are? The least amount of masturbation happening is Alaska, 31.4%, which was actually kind of surprising to me. South Carolina and West Virginia. So sex and masturbation kind of follow an inverse. pattern in many states with those typically recording more sexual activity, logging less masturbation and vice versa. So makes sense.

All right. So looking at key holidays, this is kind of fun Valentine's Day, which is, you know, very topical. This podcast is getting released around Valentine's Day, which is exciting. And we saw that Valentine's Day weekend was the most popular pair of days for members to record sex with 33% of members recording sex on Valentine's Day. and 27% on the night before. So that's, I guess, not too shocking.

And New Year's Eve and New Year's Day came in at second and third, the most popular days for members to record sex, both averaging 9% more entries than the typical day. And then we've got some very interesting data around the Super Bowl, which I know, Michaela, you'll be very interesting as being Australian. I'm very curious. So looking at members living in cities participating, In the 2021 Super Bowl, we found a very slight decrease in the winning teams recorded sexual activity from 22.7% to 21.5%.

But a 40% decrease in sexual activity recorded by the losing team. So when you're winning, things are all good. When you're losing, things are not in the mood, apparently. You don't want to borrow it, as we say here. Michaela, this has been a super fun conversation. Thank you for helping us explore a lot of literature that's out there. now and your own research. Where can people find you? Yeah, so I've got a Twitter account, which is SleepSci, but also if you just Google my name on Google Scholar, you'll see all my research output and then links to my papers and emails are all on there. So it's pretty easy to find me these days. Okay, thank you to Kristen and Dr. Michaela Lestella for coming on

the WOOP podcast. That is all you need to know about sex. If you enjoyed the WOOP podcast, please subscribe, leave us a review or a rating. You can check us out on social media at WOOP, at Will Ahmed, and you can get 15% off a WOOP membership if you use the code Will. That's just WI-L. Check us out at Woop.com. All right, that's it for now, folks. Stay healthy and stay in the green. Thank you.