What’s better than earning an extra $50,000 a year? Having sex once a week, finds a new study.
New research conducted by the University of Toronto set out to find why sex makes us so happy. In the report published in the personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, from a series of experiments, researchers discovered that it might not just be sex, but rather the post-coitus cuddling.
In the first experiment, 335 Americans were quizzed on their relationship habits – how often they had sex, how happy they were and whether they were kissing or cuddling regularly. Researchers repeated the experiment but this time with 74 couples based in San Francisco.
RELATED: This Is How Much Sex You Should Have Each Week To Be Happy
Lastly, they recruited 106 Swiss couples, asking them to record their relationship habits as well. Undoubtedly, they found that the more often a couple had sex, their higher their relationship satisfaction was. But interestingly they also found that affection continued several hours after having sex.
However, results still proved ambiguous. Scientists are unsure of what caused the happiness – the sex itself, the cuddling or intimacy – but there is still enough concrete evidence to suggest that affection is the underlying cause of happiness. So if you can’t quite get that raise, maybe tee up a cuddle?