Run Game Conversation

Casual sex and feelings: what to do when emotions show up

6 min read

Casual sex leaves different people in different places. Some walk away glad, some feel nothing much, some feel a pull toward the other person they didn't plan on, and some feel regret. Often it's more than one of those over a few days. The research on this is real but limited, and the honest summary is that outcomes vary a lot from person to person.

Everyone in this article is an adult, and everything here assumes both people wanted what happened. If either person wasn't sure, that's a separate conversation, and consent and respect covers it.

What the research shows, and what it doesn't

A 2012 literature review by Garcia and colleagues pulled together studies on hookups among emerging adults, mostly college students in North America. It's a narrative review, so it describes studies rather than pooling them into one number. A few of the figures it reports, each from a different study:

Those are group averages from student samples, often from the 2000s. They tell you nothing about any one person, and they don't say all women want X or all men want Y. The groups overlap heavily in every one of those figures: many men preferred a relationship, and more than half of the women were glad they'd done it. The authors also point out that recall can bias this kind of research, and that results depend on how regret is measured (ever, last time, or typical).

A second study is worth knowing about because it looked at why people hook up, not just whether. Zhana Vrangalova surveyed 528 Cornell undergraduates at the start and end of an academic year. As Cornell's summary puts it, why people hooked up mattered more than whether they did. Hookups driven by external pressures were tied to worse outcomes: peer pressure, trying to boost self-esteem, hoping it would lead to a relationship, or coercion by intoxication. Hookups driven by the person's own wish for pleasure, intimacy or excitement weren't linked to those outcomes. The sample was one university, and the study can't prove cause.

Last, a study of 483 first-year women at one US university, by Fielder and colleagues, found that hookup behavior was associated with depressive symptoms in the same period but didn't predict depression later, and depression didn't predict later hookups. It was about adverse outcomes, so it says nothing on positive reactions, and it covers one school and women only.

Put together: evidence is mixed, mostly about students, and mostly correlational. A claim that casual sex is fine for everyone, or harmful for everyone, goes past the data.

When the feelings are yours

Catching feelings is common enough that it's worth planning for, without panic. A common suggestion is to wait a few days before deciding what the feeling means. It may settle, or it may not, and either answer is useful.

Questions that help sort it out:

If the answer to the last one is no, that's information, and you can act on it. Telling someone you've started to want more is not a failure. It's the honest next step, and the other person gets to decide what to do with it.

When the feelings are theirs

Sometimes you're the one who learns the other person wants more than you do. A kind, plain response beats a vague one:

Both are true statements, which matters. Letting someone hope because it's convenient is what Run Game's own values describe as leading someone on. If you've said where you stand, the other person can decide with real information, and you can stop without anyone being blindsided.

Having the conversation

Pick a moment that isn't mid-night, and keep it short. One approach that tends to work:

  1. Say what you've noticed in yourself. "I've started to want more than casual."
  2. Ask where they are. "Is that something you'd want too, or is that not what you're after?"
  3. Listen to the answer without arguing with it.
  4. Agree on what happens next, even if that's "we stop seeing each other for a while."

Mismatches are common. Handling them kindly is the part you control. Seeing someone again after your first night has texts for each answer, and casual dating: setting honest expectations has more lines for the early version of this talk, and talking stage vs situationship covers the gray area where nobody has named what's happening.

If one person says they're done, that settles it. No follow-up asking them to reconsider, no testing whether they mean it.

If it left you feeling low

Regret, loneliness or a low mood after a hookup is common enough to show up in the studies above, and it doesn't mean you did something wrong or that you're weak. If the feeling lasts for weeks, gets worse, or starts to affect sleep, work or relationships, talking to a counselor or doctor is reasonable. Therapy for guys covers how to start. This article isn't medical or mental health advice. If something happened that you didn't want, RAINN's National Sexual Assault Hotline is 800-656-4673 (US).

What to do next

  1. Wait two or three days before you decide what a feeling means or send a "we need to talk" message.
  2. Write down in your own notes what you wanted going in. Compare it with what you want now.
  3. If you want more, say so in one or two plain sentences, in person or on a call if you can.
  4. If they say they want more and you don't, tell them clearly that day and don't keep things going out of kindness.
  5. Agree on what contact looks like afterward, including "none for now."
  6. If low mood sticks around for more than two weeks, book a conversation with a doctor or counselor.

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