Size shouldn’t matter to partner

Intimacy should be more complex than external anatomy

A+photo+illustration+that+demonstrates+size+doesnt+matter+using+various+vegetables.

RACHEL SUN | Evergreen Photo Illustration

A photo illustration that demonstrates size doesn’t matter using various vegetables.

DYLAN GREENE, Evergreen deputy sports editor

Be honest men — at some point in our lives we have all looked down and wondered, “is it big enough?”

I know I have.

We typically measure the size of it with a ruler, finger or maybe even a phone.

As men, we always worry about the size and wonder if it’s good enough to satisfy a partner. But, as it turns out, men really do not need to go through all this fuss.

WSU professor of psychology Laurie Smith-Nelson, who teaches human sexuality, said men shouldn’t worry about size.

“Size is absolutely unrelated to partner satisfaction,” she said.

Researchers at University of California, Los Angeles and California State, Los Angeles, published a report showing women’s disinterest in size. More than 26,000 women, aged 18 to 65, participated in the survey.

Their findings concluded that 7 out of every 8 women feel satisfied with their man’s size. Only 14 percent wished it was larger, and two percent wished it was smaller.

Cut, a video content creator website, conducted a survey of 33 women between the ages of 18 and 50 and asked them, “Does size really matter?”

Only about a third of the women said “Yes,” size does matter. The younger women in the survey generally answered “No.”

In fact, only two women under the age of 30 answered with a firm “Yes.” But half the women between the ages of 30 and 39 thought size mattered, which could be due to a generation gap.

Some women even asked questions of their own. One asked about size, “as in height or width or strength? There’s so many different sizes.”

It’s true. This question is vague and open to interpretation. Most women felt size is not the most important attribute. These women generally agreed that it is more about how a man uses it, rather than its actual size.

One woman said, “When you’re talking about the heart or the vision, size matters.”

Most of the women had one common theme in all their answers: confidence. They were more concerned with men being confident in the size of their penis than the actual size itself.

They said that confidence, or lack thereof, will show up in the bedroom as well.

Smith-Nelson said paying attention to your partner, as well as listening and reciprocating, are a few factors that actually affect sexual satisfaction between couples.

She said she believes pornography has contributed significantly to this misconception that size matters.

“You watch pornography and, whether you are male or female, you are likely to come away with a completely twisted and distorted view of what is attractive and what creates sexual satisfaction,” Smith-Nelson said.

Throughout childhood and adulthood, men are exposed to pornography that shows men with comparatively large penises, which in turn affects their perception of size. This misconstrued view causes men to feel self-conscious about their size and affects their self-esteem in sexual relationships.

“This myth creates insecurity, it creates a barrier to really satisfying, sexual relationships because people are so focused on something that doesn’t make a difference,” Smith-Nelson said, “and they can’t really focus on the things that do make a difference.”

If men want to have a lot of good sex, they should focus on doing more housework and creating a deep intimacy with their partner, Smith-Nelson said. Men should not worry about penis size.

“The more housework men do, the more sex they have,” Smith-Nelson said.

The real problem with this debate is, as a culture, we have created the perception that size is the most important sexual factor. It’s not. Society needs to be educated on this issue for the myth to fade from existence.

“We need to shift our definition of what it means to be a successful male from having a big penis to being a good partner,” Smith-Nelson said.

And besides, if someone is more concerned about the size of the package than the whole package, then let’s face it — she’s probably not the one.