UK rides high in new index of casual sex

British men and women are among the world's most promiscuous, an international survey of sexual behaviour and attitudes has found.

In an index measuring one-night stands, numbers of partners and attitudes to sex, Britain comes out ahead of other industrialised nations such as Australia, the US, France, the Netherlands, Italy and Germany. Some 14,000 people in 48 countries filled in questionnaires about casual sex and how many people they expected to sleep with in the next five years. The results were turned into an index of 'sociosexuality' - a measure of how sexually liberal people are in thought and behaviour.

Most individuals scored between 4 and 65. Finland came highest, with an average of 51. Britain's average score was 40, placing it 11th - a result linked to the decline of religious scruples, the growth of equal rights for women and a highly sexualised popular culture.

'Historically we have repressed women's short-term mating and there were all sorts of double standards out there where men's short-term mating was sort of acceptable but women's wasn't,' said Professor David Schmitt of Bradley University in Illinois, who oversaw the research.