How and why women use lubricants during sexual activity

Background: The use of lubricants during sexual activity has been recommended as a strategy to reduce the likelihood of vaginal tearing that can increase risk for HIV and other STI. To date, no prospective reports have described, in any detailed way, how women use lubricants during sexual activity, why they use them, and how they feel about them.

Methods: Women (n = 2,453) enrolled in a prospective daily diary study, providing event-level reports describing their use of water-based or silicone-based lubricants during sexual activity. Analyses included descriptive statistics and repeated measures ANOVA.

Results: Participants were primarily heterosexual (85.6%) and married (56.4%), with a mean age of 32.5 years. When applying lubricant, 58.4% of events involved application to the woman's genitals by their sexual partner, 54.7% involved women applying lubricant to their own or their partner's fingers, and 53.4% involved women applying lubricant directly on their partner's genitals. Most frequently reported reasons for lubricant use included the desire to reduce the risk of tearing (22%) and to make sex more comfortable (21.8%). Women strongly endorsed the notion that lubricant use improved the sexual experience; in over 70% of events women indicated that lubricant use made sex feel very pleasurable and more comfortable (65.5%).

Conclusions: These insights into women's use of lubricants can be helpful to medical and other public health professionals who routinely make recommendations to women about ways to incorporate products into their sexual activities.