Premature or rapid ejaculation: heterosexual couples' perceptions of men's ejaculatory behavior

This study investigated the relationship between men's and their female partner's perceptions of men's ejaculatory behavior as well as the impact of premature or rapid ejaculation on couple functioning. One hundred fifty-two men and their female partners provided information about the man's ejaculatory behavior, their perceptions of whether the man had a problem with premature or rapid ejaculation (RE), their sexual and relationship satisfaction, and their sexual concerns. The men's and women's reports on the man's ejaculatory behavior were only moderately correlated. In general, the women saw RE as less of a problem for the men than their male partners reported for themselves. The women's perceptions of both the men's ejaculatory behavior and his affective responses were uniquely related to her own and her partner's identification of him as having an RE problem. For both the men and the women, having more characteristics of RE was related to lower sexual satisfaction, but was unrelated to relationship satisfaction. RE characteristics were also related to the number of non-RE sexual concerns reported by the men, but not to the number of sexual concerns reported by their female partner. However, men and women who identified the man as having an RE problem rated RE as having only a slightly negative impact on their own or their partners functioning. The results suggest that, for most couples, the timing of ejaculation adversely affects sexual satisfaction but not overall relationship and personal functioning.