CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa, Jan. 25 (UPI) -- Seventy-eight percent of older women who were sexually active said they were satisfied with their overall sex life, U.S. researchers found.
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine said the study involved 806 older women who live in a San Diego-area planned community and whose health was tracked for 40 years.
The women ranged in age from ages 40-99, with a median age of 67.
The researchers found 61 percent of all women in the study -- and 78 percent of women who were sexually active -- said they were satisfied with their overall sex life, and that sexual satisfaction increased with age among sexually active older women.
The study, published in the American Journal of Medicine, found satisfaction with the amount of emotional closeness during sexual activity with a partner was associated with more frequent arousal, lubrication and orgasm.
However, frequency of vaginal lubrication during sexual activity decreased with age -- 60.8 percent of the youngest women reported lubrication almost always, compared with only 28.6 percent of women age 80 or older. A similar trend was reported with frequency of and difficulty maintaining lubrication, the study said.
