This lecture/workshop is aimed at higher education health and counseling staff. It includes an overview of the literature on hook up culture, a discussion of the theoretical issues/advances, and recommendations for institutions.

1. Hook Up Culture
…to the best of our knowledge
Occidental College
Sociological Images
lisa-wade.com • @lisawade •

2. • What we know about hook up culture…
• Where is it?
• What is it?
• How do they happen?
• And when?
• Who hooks up?
• What do students want from hook ups?
• Whether they’re getting these things?
• And whether they like it?
• Things to consider…
• What can institutions do?

3. • The Online College Social Life Survey
• Paula England et al.
• Ethnography of a Midwestern “Party Dorm”
• Laura Hamilton and Elizabeth Armstrong et al.
• Diaries from Students at a Small Private Liberal Arts
College
• Lisa Wade and Caroline Heldman
• …and more.

4. • Almost everywhere.

5. • Definition:
• Sexually-charged activities…
• in a non-relationship context (and with no promise of one)
• usually involving alcohol
• In Practice:
• 34% included only kissing and non-genital touching
• Another 16% included hand-to-genital stimulation
• Another 11% included oral sex
• Another 39% included intercourse
Armstrong, E., P. England, & A. Fogarty. 2012. Accounting for Women’s Orgasm and
Sexual Enjoyment in College Hookups and Relationships. American Sociological Review
77, 3: 435-462.

6. • “planned spontaneity”
“There‟s, like, this system that‟s like, you‟re
gonna get drunk, randomly meet randoms,
and just, like, whatever happens.”
• At parties and dances
“They dance in big circles and help their
friends to find attractive/suitable partners.
…close friends will give a thumbs up if a guy
coming up behind one of them is a cute
catch...”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. Unpublished Data.

7. Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

8. • Weekly cycle
• Semester cycle
• Four-year cycle

9. • About 30% of students will never hook up. 30%
• Of the ones that do:
• 40% have had 3 or fewer hook ups by their senior year
28%
• 40% have had between 4 and 9 28%
• 20% have had ten or more 14%
100%

10. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Middle or upper class
• Conventionally attractive
• Non-church going

11. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
“I was uncomfortable . . . in the sense
that all of the girls kind of have to
compete with each other to get the
alcohol, and it just screams so much
like prostitution to me. You know,
even if they‟re not literally having sex
with the guys, it‟s just like they‟re . . .
selling their flirtiness for beer or
something, and that‟s just so not me.”
Hamilton, L. 2007. Trading on Heterosexuality: College Women’s Gender Strategies and
Homophobia. Gender & Society 21, 2: 145-172.

12. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
Hamilton, L. 2007. Trading on Heterosexuality: College Women’s Gender Strategies and
Homophobia. Gender & Society 21, 2: 145-172.

13. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
“I went to the straight bar with my
girlfriend and stood next to her, let
alone kissed her, that would not be
okay. But that these little girls kissing
and giggling is A-okay because it‟s
implied that there‟s no pleasure there
or that it‟s to please men rather than
to please themselves.”
Hamilton, L. 2007. Trading on Heterosexuality: College Women’s Gender Strategies and
Homophobia. Gender & Society 21, 2: 145-172.

14. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
R2: “Sometimes we get a little out of control
and trashed, but it‟s not like we‟re going
crazy on each other. Like, it‟s just to be
funny. It‟s random kisses. It‟s not serious.”
R1: “Right (laughs). It‟s not like I want you or
anything. Eww.”
Hamilton, L. 2007. Trading on Heterosexuality: College Women’s Gender Strategies and
Homophobia. Gender & Society 21, 2: 145-172.

15. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White

16. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive

17. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
As “close to Barbie as you can get.”
Butler, J. & S. Hays. Unpublished. Hooking Up as a Shared Cultural Narrative.

18. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
As “close to Barbie as you can get.”
“The Blonde.”
Hamilton, L. & E. Armstrong. 2009. Gendered Sexuality in Young Adulthood:
Double Binds and Flawed Options. Gender & Society 23, 5: 589-616.

19. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class

20. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class
“I‟ve always looked at college as the
only time in your life when you should
be a hundred percent selfish. . . . I
have the rest of my life to devote to a
husband or kids or my job . . . but right
now, it‟s my time”.
Hamilton, L. & E. Armstrong. 2009. Gendered Sexuality in Young Adulthood:
Double Binds and Flawed Options. Gender & Society 23, 5: 589-616.

21. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class
“College is the only time that you don‟t
have obligations to anyone but
yourself… I want to get settled down
and figure out what I‟m doing with my
life before [I] dedicate myself to
something or someone else.”
Hamilton, L. & E. Armstrong. 2009. Gendered Sexuality in Young Adulthood:
Double Binds and Flawed Options. Gender & Society 23, 5: 589-616.

22. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper these girls don‟t even go to
“Some of class
class. It‟s like they just live here. They
stay up until 4:00 in the morning. [I want
to ask,] „Do you guys go to class? Like
what‟s your deal? … You‟re paying a lot
of money for this… If you want to be here,
then why aren‟t you trying harder?‟”
Hamilton, L. 2007. Trading on Heterosexuality: College Women’s Gender
Strategies and Homophobia. Gender & Society 21, 2: 145-172.

23. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class
“I didn‟t feel like I was growing up. I
felt like I was actually getting younger
the way I was trying to act. Growing
up to me isn‟t going out and getting
smashed and sleeping around… That
to me is immature.”
Hamilton, L. & E. Armstrong. 2009. Gendered Sexuality in Young Adulthood:
Double Binds and Flawed Options. Gender & Society 23, 5: 589-616.

24. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class
“I thought I‟d get married in
college… When I was still in high
school, I figured by my senior year,
I‟d be engaged or married or
something… I wanted to have kids
before I was 25.”
Hamilton, L. & E. Armstrong. 2009. Gendered Sexuality in Young Adulthood:
Double Binds and Flawed Options. Gender & Society 23, 5: 589-616.

25. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class
“My high school sweetheart is “the
one I want to spend the rest of my life
with… Really, I don‟t want to date
anybody else.”
Hamilton, L. & E. Armstrong. 2009. Gendered Sexuality in Young Adulthood:
Double Binds and Flawed Options. Gender & Society 23, 5: 589-616.

26. • College students at the top of the social status
hierarchy.
• Heterosexual
• White
• Conventionally attractive
• Middle or upper class
• Non-church going

27. • Validation
• Status
• Pleasure
• Empowerment
• Relationships
• Connection

28. • Validation (YES AND NO)
“When a girl hooks up, it’s like if a
guy tells you that you’re pretty, but
more intense than that.”
Butler, J. & S. Hays. Unpublished. Hooking Up as a Shared Cultural Narrative.

29. • Validation (YES AND NO)
“I realize that I have probably had
one of the least sexually successful
freshman years of someone who
actively desires to be sexually active
and engaged. This realization is
really depressing, as it does make
me feel inadequate and unwanted.”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. Unpublished Data.

30. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
“When I‟ve just got laid, the first thing I
that about—really, I shouldn‟t be telling
you this, but really it‟s the very first
thing, before I‟ve even like „finished‟—is
that I can‟t wait to tell my crew who I
just did. Like, I say to myself, „Omigod,
they‟re not going to believe I just did
Kristy!‟”
Kalish, R. & M. Kimmel. 2011. Hooking Up: Hot Hetero Sex or the New Numb
Normative? Australian Feminist Studies 26, 67: 137-151.

31. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
“[P]art of the hook-up culture is
hooking up with someone and then
telling someone about it.”
“Friday morning debrief is a major part
of it. That takes up, like, half our day.”
Butler, J. & S. Hays. Unpublished. Hooking Up as a Shared Cultural Narrative.

32. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)

33. Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

34. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
“I know that he wants to make me
happy. I know that he wants me to
orgasm. I know that, and like just
me knowing that we are connected
and like we‟re going for the same
thing and that like he cares.”
Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

35. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
“If it‟s just a random hookup, I don‟t think
[her orgasm] matters as much to the
guy… I don‟t think it‟s gonna matter to
them as much... But if you‟re with
somebody for more than just that one
night… I know I feel personally
responsible. I think it‟s essential that she
has an orgasm during sexual activity. “
Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

36. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
“When I... meet somebody and I‟m
gonna have a random hookup... from
what I have seen, they‟re not even
trying to, you know, make it a mutual
thing.”
Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

37. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
“I will do everything in my power to, like
whoever I‟m with, to get [him] off. Just
because it makes me feel like I‟m good at
sex...”
Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

38. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
“I didn‟t feel comfortable I guess. I
don‟t know. I think I felt kind of guilty
almost, like I felt like I was kind of
subjecting people to something they
didn‟t want to do and I felt bad about
it.”
Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

39. Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

40. Women who say they enjoyed the sexual activity “very
much.”
Hook up: 50%
Relationship: 81%
Women who say they enjoyed the sexual activity “very
much” or “somewhat.”
Hook up: 86%
Relationship: 97%

41. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
“…if there‟s nothing wrong about it
then it‟s automatically a good thing.”
Maher, C. Unpublished Manuscript. Hook Up Culture: Investigating the Collegiate Sexual
Arena and its Consequences for Women.

42. Armstrong, E., P. England, & Alison Fogarty. 2009. Orgasm in College Hookups and
Relationships. In Families as They Really Are, edited by Barbara Risman. New York:
W.W. Norton and Co.

43. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
“I felt compelled to flirt with these boys…
simply because I was drunk and am a
girl.”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. Unpublished Data.

44. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
“Figuratively speaking, when I think
about my sex life it feels like my
insides tie themselves tight together
before they boil and rot. Worrying
about it saps a lot of time and
energy from my life.”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. Unpublished Data.

45. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
“With these feelings of loneliness and
inadequacy comes a feeling that I am lame
and pathetic and ugly and it definitely
interferes with my ability to be happy. The
sexual aspect of is part of it but it isn't the
sole problem—the lack of companionship
Wade, L. & C. and feeling of human closeness is very
Heldman. Unpublished Data.
depressing.”

46. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
“It is really difficult to never have any
kind of physical contact and feeling of
closeness with another. I am left longing
for someone to just hold close or the
like—something that seems so simple,
but for me, isn't.”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. Unpublished Data.

47. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
“…you feel like you have to be this fabulous
lover and they have to come at least three
times, and like, your, you know, your, uh, dick
isn‟t the biggest she‟s ever seen, and like you
always feel like you‟re being measured and
coming up a bit… [he laughs uncomfortably],
Kalish, R. & M.short.”2011. Hooking Up: Hot Hetero Sex or the New Numb
Kimmel.
Normative? Australian Feminist Studies 26, 67: 137-151.

48. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
• Relationships (YES)
“There‟s like, three ranges: one-night
stand, then hooking up—like, undefined
exclusively or un-exclusively but you‟re
hooking up for an extended period of time
that usually maxes out at, like, four to six
weeks—then you‟re dating.”
Butler, J. & S. Hays. Unpublished. Hooking Up as a Shared Cultural Narrative.

49. • Validation (YES AND NO)
• Status (YES AND NO)
• Pleasure (IT’S COMPLICATED)
• Empowerment (OVERWHELMINGLY NO)
• Relationships (YES)
• Connection (DEFINITELY NO)
“…like, you make me feel optimistic or
you make me feel alive or you make me
feel safe. Or you inspire me.”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. 2012. Hooking Up and Opting Out. In Sex for Life, edited
by J. DeLamater & L. Carpenter. New York: New York University Press.

50. • Definitely: ~10%
• Ambivalent: ~55%
• No way: ~35%

51. • Hooking up is a frame.

52. • Hooking up is a frame.
• A campus with casual sex is different than a hook up
culture.
“It is much harder to stick to my high
morals of remaining pure here… I find
myself in conflict with myself... Always
having to internally fight the desire to
do sexual things with girls is not
easy… the carefree atmosphere really
has hit me… I felt more free and
unbounded, but at the same time, guilt
beyond imagination.”
Wade, L. & C. Heldman. Unpublished Data.

53. • Hooking up is a frame.
• A campus with casual sex is different than a hook up
culture.
• There are some real problems with hook up culture…

54. • Hooking up is a frame.
• A campus with casual sex is different than a hook up
culture.
• There are some real problems with hook up culture…
• …but they’re American problems typical of the West.

55. • Hooking up is a frame.
• A campus with casual sex is different than a hook up
culture.
• There are some real problems with hook up culture…
• …but they’re American problems typical of the West.
• Promoting relationships is probably not the answer.

56. • Hooking up is a frame.
• A campus with casual sex is different than a hook up
culture.
• There are some real problems with hook up culture…
• …but they’re American problems typical of the West.
• Promoting relationships is probably not the answer.
• And, besides, students learn a lot.
“…every experience that I have had with
these guys has taught me more about who
I am and what type of role sex has in my
life. I am no longer afraid to give into my
desires, but I am also aware of what I feel
Wade, L. & C. is rightUnpublished Data.
Heldman. and wrong.”

57. • Start a campus conversation about hook up culture.
• Start it the first day students arrive on campus.
• Talk about pleasure.
• Talk about the students who AREN’T hooking up.
• Teach students about “pluralistic ignorance.”
• Think through your institution’s alcohol policies.
• Ensure that campus events interrupt the hook up script.
• Take steps to minimize its harm.
• Enhance student body diversity.
• Nurture subcultures on campus.

58. Discussion
Occidental College
Sociological Images
lisa-wade.com • @lisawade •