The impact of daily sexual desire and daily sexual desire discrepancy on the quality of the sexual experience in couples

Recent research has found associations between sexual desire, desire discrepancy, and satisfaction outcomes in individuals and couples on a broad level. The present study aimed to extend these findings to the event level through examining daily experiences of sexual desire, sexual desire discrepancy, and quality of the sexual experience in a sample of 87 mixed-sex couples (174 individuals) over a 30-day period through daily electronic report. Participants were in their relationships for an average of 9.3 years. Data were analyzed using over-time Actor Partner Interdependence Models (APIM). For women and men, higher actor daily sexual desire predicted higher actor quality of the sexual experience. In addition, higher partner daily sexual desire predicted higher actor quality of the sexual experience. Event-level desire discrepancy between the couple was also a significant predictor of actor quality of the sexual experience for women, though not for men. These results confirm that day-to-day sexual desire and desire discrepancy are important indicators of quality of the sexual relationship and emphasize the importance of considering event-level characteristics when examining sexual behaviour and couple dynamics. Implications and suggestions for future research are also discussed.