Month: February 2013

BDSM safeword survey – does age alter behaviour?

This article looks at how people who answered the safeword survey said they used safewords and whether this differed for older or younger respondents.

It does. There are large variations according to age and also dependant on whether the BDSM interaction is with a relationship partner or a play partner.

The survey, of course, isn’t representative of anything except the views of people who took part. It’s important to note that some of the age groups are quite small. There were only eight people aged 18-20 (all were women) and four over 70 (all men). The other groups ranged in size from 77 to 148 so are more likely to reflect a spread of opinion (496 of the 533 people in the sample answered the question).

safeword use by age

Only 18-20 year olds were more likely to use safewords with both relationship partners and with pay partners.

Over all the age groups, when it came to relationship partners, every group except the 18-20s said they were more likely not to use safewords (other than people of 70 or older where the decision was split 50-50).

When it comes to BDSM interactions with play partners, five of the seven age groups said they were more likely to use safe words than not. The two age-groups that said they were less likely to use safewords (21-29 and 30-39 year olds) only did so by a margin of two or three per cent.

Data for this article

The data for this article was compiled from that contained in the table below.

Thinking of BDSM interactions with your principal relationship partner(s) and safewords…
Which category below includes your age? I always use a safeword I mostly use a safeword I mostly DON’T use a safeword I never use a safeword Grand Total
Female 18-20 6 1 1 8
21-29 10 7 6 27 50
30-39 22 5 20 46 93
40-49 21 10 19 46 96
50-59 9 4 7 19 39
60-69 2 1 2 2 7
Female Total 70 28 54 141 293
Male 21-29 8 2 2 10 22
30-39 12 8 12 15 47
40-49 12 9 4 30 55
50-59 13 6 11 23 53
60-69 8 3 3 4 18
70 or older 1 1 1 1 4
Male Total 54 29 33 83 199
Grand Total 124 57 87 224 492
Thinking of BDSM interactions with play partners and safewords…
Which category below includes your age? I always use a safeword I mostly use a safeword I mostly DON’T use a safeword I never use a safeword Grand Total
Female 18-20 6 2 8
21-29 15 5 14 16 50
30-39 28 14 25 26 93
40-49 36 13 19 28 96
50-59 13 6 9 11 39
60-69 2 2 1 2 7
Female Total 100 40 70 83 293
Male 21-29 9 7 3 3 22
30-39 14 13 13 7 47
40-49 15 12 11 17 55
50-59 18 7 14 14 53
60-69 10 3 3 2 18
70 or older 2 1 1 4
Male Total 68 43 45 43 199
Grand Total 168 83 115 126 492

Background

This is the third article about the safeword survey I recently conducted. More information about the terms and ideas I use in these surveys can be found here. Information about the demographics of this survey is here.

This article can be compared with an earlier one, looking at how people use safewords with their principal relationship partners.

Related articles

BDSM Safeword Survey – who uses safewords with play partners

BelasariusThe safeword survey survey asked the question “Thinking of BDSM interactions with your play partner(s) and of safewords…” and then asked how likely the respondent was to use a safeword.

500 of the 533 people in the sample answered the question.

This article looks at the use of safewords with play partners and looks at the differences that characterised respondents to the survey, based on their BDSM orientation.

Switches use safewords more.

Safeword Survey play partners switch top dominant bottom submissive

I looked just at those people who always use safewords or never use safewords, crosstabbed with their BDSM orientation (Chart 4). Both switches and Tops/dominants said they were more likely to always use a safeword with play partners than to never use a safeword. By contrast, bottoms/submissives stated they were more likely to never use a safeword.

This contrasts with the way people use safewords with their principal relationship partners, where far fewer said they used safewords.

Safewords – and numbers of play partners

I asked respondents how many people they played with in a year. I thought it might be interesting to look at whether the number of play partners people said they had affected the way they used safewords.

Bottoms/submissives

bottom submissive play partner safeword use

Bottoms/submissives who said they only played with one person in the last 12 months are much more likely to never use a safeword than they are to use one all the time. But bottoms and submissives with low or moderate numbers of play parters (between two and five) said they are more likely to use a safeword all the time than not to use one at all.By contrast those who said played with larger numbers of people may be more devil-may-care and are much more likely to never use a safeword than always to use one.

Switches

Switch safeword use

 

Switches contrasted sharply with both bottoms/submissives and tops/dominants. Throughout the sample switch respondents stated they were more likely to always use a safeword than to never use a safeword. And, with a couple of exceptions, the more play partners a respondent had, the more likely this was to be what they said.

Tops/Dominants

Top and dominant use of safewords

Tops/dominants with a single plat partner said they were much more likely never to use a safeword than to always use one. But for every other no. of partners the reverse was true. Though the proportion always using a safeword was very much higher than the proportion that never use a safeword, for every number of partners other than one, the levels of safeword use reported were fairly level in comparison with switches – where it respondents reported that the more partners they had the more likely they were to use a safeword all the time.

Data for this article.

The table below shows the numbers of respondents from which the charts above were compiled. Some of the groups are very small.

Thinking of BDSM interactions with play partners and safewords…
No of play partners I always use a safeword I mostly DON’T use a safeword I mostly use a safeword I never use a safeword All
Bottom/Submissive 1 32 18 7 53 110
2 22 18 7 12 59
3 10 14 9 7 40
4 5 7 7 4 23
5 4 2 4 2 12
“5-10” 4 6 3 7 20
“10 or more” 2 2 3 5 12
Bottom/Submissive Total 79 67 40 90 276
Switch 1 12 6 4 4 26
2 5 3 2 4 14
3 6 4 4 1 15
4 3 1 2 6
5 5 2 1 8
“5-10” 6 2 8 1 17
“10 or more” 3 1 4
Switch Total 40 17 22 11 90
Top/Dominant 1 8 6 3 15 32
2 11 8 4 4 27
3 11 8 5 3 27
4 5 1 4 2 12
5 2 2 1 1 6
“5-10” 6 4 2 1 13
“10 or more” 8 6 3 17
Top/Dominant Total 51 35 22 26 134
Total 170 119 84 127 500

Background

This is the third article about the safeword survey I recently conducted. More information about the terms and ideas I use in these surveys can be found here. Information about the demographics of this survey is here.

This article can be compared with an earlier one, looking at how people use safewords with their principal relationship partners.

Related articles

What do sadists really like (and submissives, and slaves, etc).

BelasariusBack in June 2012 I ran a survey on BDSM styles and relationships (or “BDSM – How Do You Like Yours”) which looked at some of the basic components of BDSM interactions.

This article looks at the question “How do various BDSM components fit into your life”. It shows, probably unsurprisingly, that respondents that characterised themselves as sadists/masochists (S/m)ranked things quite differently from dominants/submissives (D/s) and masters (mistresses)/slaves (M/s)

S/m people said pain was better than sex. For M/s respondents control, service and ritual came before a roll in the hay. D/s people put sex first, but only a tiny, tiny bit ahead of control.

More details are found in the charts below – where the top three interactions  for each group appear in darker colours and the bottom two in lighter shades.

Background

Respondents were asked to score each area 1- 5 in a range of responses that were:

  1. I don’t do this
  2. I dislike this
  3. This is neither important nor unimportant
  4. This is important to me
  5. This is essential to me

The ten areas of interaction were:

  • Pain
  • Bondage
  • Fetish dressing
  • Humiliation
  • Exhibitionism
  • Sex
  • Safewords
  • Service
  • Ritual
  • Control

429 people answered the question: 94 said they were sadists/masochists, 277 said they were dominants/submissives and 58 said they were masters/slaves. 31 people skipped the question.

Sadists & Masochists

S&M interactions

Those who responded saying they were sadists and masochists put pain  a long way ahead of everything else as the thing that was most important to them. Bondage just edged sex into third place. Control, in fourth, was fairly important too. Service and ritual came ninth and tenth.

Masters (mistresses) and slaves.

M & s interactions

Control is the biggest thing for respondents in this group, with service coming second and ritual and sex a short way behind, in joint third. The least important factors are fetish dressing and safewords, which trails a long way behind the other factors. Bondage was a little more important than pain to M/s people.

Dominants and submissives

D&S interactions

Dominants and submissives were the only group who put sex at the top of their list. And then, it is only a teensy way in front of control, with bondage a little way behind. Pain comes fourth. The two areas that least interest the D/s people who took part are humiliation and, last of all, exhibitionism.

Related articles

 

BDSM People and multiple partnerships (from styles and relationships survey)

Belasarius“BDSM styles and relationships” was the second survey I did (the first was on BDSM and Education) I am in the process of transferring the articles i wrote about the results of these from my blog on the UK BDSM website http://www.informedconsent.co.uk which is due to close at the end of February. That survey asked a question about the nature of people`s relationships (whether they were in one, whether they were monogamous and if they had multiple partners, how aware they were of each other, etc). I asked a similar question in the survey I did on BDSM symbols of ownership and the responses to that can be found in this article.

First, the question was answered by 429 people of whom 94 said they were sadists/masochists, 277 said they were dominants/submissives and 58 said they were masters/slaves. 31 people skipped the question.

The options asked about (and the answers, in percentages, given by each group) are below:

Total sample

  •  I am not in a relationship; 19%
  • I only have one partner; 48%
  • My partners all know about each other; 7%
  • My partners and their partners all know about each other and me; 11%
  • None of my partners know about each other; 5%
  • My secondary partner(s) knows about my primary partner; 7%
  • Some of my partners know about each other; 5%

Sadists/masochists

  • I am not in a relationship; 27%
  • I only have one partner; 37%
  • My partners all know about each other; 10%
  • My partners and their partners all know about each other and me; 9%
  • None of my partners know about each other; 6%
  • My secondary partner(s) knows about my primary partner; 4%
  • Some of my partners know about each other; 7%

Dominant/submissives

  • I am not in a relationship; 18%
  •  I only have one partner; 50%
  •  My partners all know about each other; 11%
  •  My partners and their partners all know about each other and me; 3%
  •  None of my partners know about each other; 8%
  •  My secondary partner(s) knows about my primary partner; 8%
  •  Some of my partners know about each other; 4%

Masters/slaves

  •  I am not in a relationship: 10%
  •  I only have one partner; 52%
  •  My partners all know about each other; 3%
  •  My partners and their partners all know about each other and me; 16%
  •  None of my partners know about each other; 10%
  •  My secondary partner(s) knows about my primary partner; 5%
  •  Some of my partners know about each other; 3%

Related articles

 

BDSM People who like “pain” and safewords

BelasariusOne of the things I usually ask in my surveys is for people to say how interested they are in aspects of BDSM interactions – things like “pain“, “control”, “service”, “bondage”, “exhibitionism“, etc.

In the context of safe words I thought it would be interesting to see how people who enjoy pain one of the intrinsically riskier BDSM practices – use safe words.

Looking at the sample as a whole (500 people answered this question) 43% of people who said “pain is essential to me” NEVER use a safeword.  27% always use a safe word. Even among those who say they dislike pain the biggest group (42%) say they never use a safe word (33% say they always do). The only group where the largest response was that they always use a safe word were among those who say they “don’t do pain”, when 57% say they always use a safe word (see table four, below).

Table 4 – Attitude to pain and use of safewords
Pain I always use a safeword I mostly DON’T use a safeword I mostly use a safeword I never use a safeword
Essential to me 27% 19% 10% 43%
I dislike this 33% 18% 6% 42%
I don’t do this 57% 14% 29% 0%
Important to me 22% 17% 13% 48%
Not important/unimportant 26% 19% 9% 46%
All 25% 18% 12% 45%

Things get even clearer if you combine the responses to “I always use a safe word” and “I mostly use a safe word” together and also pair “I never use a safeword” with “I mostly DON’T use a safe word”. This then shows that, when it comes to inflicting or receiving pain, roughly one in three are inclined to use safewords and roughly two thirds are inclined not to. (table 5). The group that said they don’t do pain (admittedly only 1.4% of the sample – just seven people) are quite different: 86% use safe words.

Table 5 – Attitude to pain and use of safewords – Use and don’t combined
Pain Always/mostly use a safeword Never/mostly don’t usa a safeword
Essential to me 38% 62%
I dislike this 39% 61%
I don’t do this 86% 14%
Important to me 36% 64%
Not important/unimportant 35% 65%
All 37% 63%

I also looked at how the picture changes if you split respondents by their BDSM orientations (Bottom/submissive, Top/dominant and Switch) – see charts four and five below. Interestingly the B/s people (72%) and T/d people (82%)  who responded  are more likely to consider pain important or essential than switches (67%). Amongst those who think pain is important the largest groups by far never use safewords or mostly don’t use them. Amongst those who dislike or won’t do pain (a small proportion of the total sample) slightly more say they always use a safeword than those who say they never do.

SfC5

SwC4

Related articles

BDSM Safe word Survey – who uses them with their principal partners

standing stoneThis is the first article about the safeword survey I recently conducted. More information about the terms and ideas I use in these surveys can be found here. Information about the demographics of this survey is here.

The survey asked the question “Thinking of BDSM interactions with your principal relationship partner(s) and of safewords…” and then asked how likely the respondent was to use a safeword. 500 of the 533 people in the sample answered the question.

Chart 1 - who uses safewords with their partners (by gender)

Chart one (above ) shows the responses to the question and Table one (below) shows the same data as percentages.

Table 1 Thinking of BDSM interactions with your principal relationship partner(s) and safewords…
Any other preference Female Male Grand Total
I always use a safeword 38% 24% 27% 25%
I mostly DON’T use a safeword 25% 18% 17% 18%
I mostly use a safeword 13% 10% 15% 12%
I never use a safeword 25% 48% 42% 45%
Grand Total 100% 100% 100% 100%

So, across the entire sample, all respondents were far more likely NOT to use safewords with their principal partners than to use safewords (the responses on play partners are quite different, as we shall see in forthcoming blogs). sixty-three percent either never use a safeword with their partner (45%) or “mostly DON’t use a safeword” (18%). Only one in four (25%) always used a safeword. This reflects the results of the survey I did here in August 2012, where 61% of the 309 people who took part said they mostly don’t use safewords.

Gender

Women appear slightly less likely to use a safeword than men. 66% of women either did not use a safeword at all or mostly did not. 59% of men answered in these ways.

BDSM Orientation

Things are different when you analyse the sample by orientation (Sadist?masochist – S/m, Dominant/submissive – D/s, and Master/slave – M/s).

Chart 2 - Who uses safewords by BDSM component

Chart 2 (above) and table 2 (below) show the raw numbers and percentages of each group that answered this question in each way.

Table 2 Thinking of BDSM interactions with your principal relationship partner(s) and safewords…
Dominant/ Submissive Master/Slave Sadist/ Masochist All
I always use a safeword 27% 6% 38% 25%
I mostly DON’T use a safeword 18% 8% 27% 18%
I mostly use a safeword 14% 2% 13% 12%
I never use a safeword 41% 84% 22% 45%
Grand Total 100% 100% 100% 100%

S/m respondents were far more likely to use a safeword (38% always did – well ahead of the sample as a whole – 25%). M/s people said they were least likely to use a safeword: Only 6% said they used one all the time and 84% said they never used them. Only 22% of S/m people said they never used a safeword.

D/s respondents (who are most of the participants) lay between these extremes and close to the averages for the sample as a whole.

BDSM Orientation

There always seems to be a bias in these surveys towards submissives, especially females. Perhaps they are just more into surveys!

Chart 3 - who uses safewords - by orientation

Chart Three (above) shows how tops/bottoms and switches use safewords and table 3 (below) gives the same data in percentages. Again, it’s clear that, across all respondents, most either don’t use a safeword at all – or not the majority of the time.

42% of Tops/dominants use safewords all or some of the time compared with 30% of bottoms/submissives. This contrasts with switches where a majority (52%) mostly use safewords.

Switches were also the group most likely to use safewords with their partners all the time – 38% said they did (20% for bottoms and 29% for tops).

Table 3 Who uses safewords by BDSM orientation
Bottom/ Submissive Switch Top/Dominant All
I always use a safeword 20% 38% 29% 25%
I mostly DON’T use a safeword 18% 26% 12% 18%
I mostly use a safeword 10% 13% 13% 12%
I never use a safeword 52% 23% 46% 45%
Grand Total 100% 100% 100% 100%
Related articles