Assessing Midlife Women's Sexuality.

Assessing Midlife Women's Sexuality, Lisa K. Smylie and Eleanor Maticka-Tyndale, University of Windsor, Canada; Julie Fraser, Windsor Essex Health Unit

Investigations into female sexuality in midlife have focused on the physiological aspects of hormonal and menopausal status. Midlife, however, is a time of psychological and sociocultural changes for women that can have significant effects on their sexuality beyond menopause. Policymakers are now acknowledging the importance of understanding the sexuality of the baby boomer generation, particularly the factors affecting the sexual behavior, attitudes, and preventative sexual health service use of people in this stage of life. Using data collected in the National Population Health Survey (NPHS), this study attempted to provide detailed, multifaceted descriptions of women's sexuality between the ages of 35 and 59 years (N = 15,249), with emphasis on psychological influences, including perception of one's body, distress, and depression, as well as social constraints, such as lack of access to sexual health services, family and work obligations, language barriers, lack of information, and financial status. Also, the research highlights the distribution of social constraints on female sexual expression in this life stage, including lack of access to health services, lack of time due to family and work obligations, language barriers, financial constraints, and lack of information. This analysis demonstrated that although the NPHS is the most comprehensive Canadian national survey on sexuality, it is out-of-date and ill-equipped for exploring sociocultural and psychological aspects of female sexuality in midlife. Better data is needed in order to develop a holistic understanding of midlife women's sexuality that can adequately inform social policy.