Goodbye to sex: experts reveal a key factor to reduced intimacy
A new 25-country study finds that this change in a relationship lowers passion and intimacy but, crucially, not commitment.
Becoming a parent changes a relationship in ways that go far beyond finances. A large cross-cultural study published on October 24, 2025 in Human Nature analyzed 3,187 married or engaged adults across 25 countries and found that parents reported lower overall romantic love than non-parents. Crucially, having more children didn’t further reduce scores, the gap appeared between those with and without kids.
Researchers used Sternberg’s Triangular Love Scale, which breaks love into intimacy, passion and commitment. Parents scored lower on intimacy (emotional closeness) and passion (desire/romance) but showed no difference in commitment compared with childless peers. This suggests that the decision to stay together may endure even as the so called “spark” and day-to-day closeness take a hit.
How does parenthood cool the heat?
The authors point to familiar culprits: sleep loss, chronic fatigue, time pressure and work–family conflict, along with tighter household budgets. These strains can squeeze the time and energy couples have for each other’s emotional and sexual needs, dampening intimacy and passion without necessarily shaking long-term commitment. Independent coverage of the paper echoes the same pattern.
The takeaway isn’t anti-parenthood... it’s pro-planning. Protect micro-rituals of connection (short, regular check-ins), schedule child-free time, share domestic labor explicitly, and build a support net where possible. Framed in Sternberg’s model, intentional “investment” in one corner of the triangle (say, intimacy) can help stabilize the others over time.
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