When it comes to dating in 2023: it’s complicated. There’s a whole host of terms used to describe the nature of sexual and romantic relationships, from situationships, to friends with benefits, and “talking stages.” But even with an entirely new vocabulary to define dating interactions and intentions, there’s one description that still reigns supreme: “casual.”
The term casual isn’t new — it was popularised in the ’90s by TV shows like Sex And The City and Seinfeld, which is why the idea is so recognisable for millennials. But it seems like the idea of casual dating might have been around for much longer than that, with a sexual revolution taking place in the latter half of the 20th century and the introduction of the contraceptive pill in the 1960s, both of which normalised having sex outside marriage with multiple partners. In fact, a study published in 1977(Opens in a new tab) found that the percentage of women who started to partake in premarital sex grew from 29 percent in 1965 to 57 percent in 1975.
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