Christmas cheer brings September babies
Christmas is a time to spend with family, eat delicious food, and — according to a new study — make babies.
Research published Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports found interest in sex peaks during the Christmas season, which could explain why birthrates soar nine months later, in September. Researchers analyzed data from 130 countries and used Google Trends to look for sex-related search terms throughout the year. They found a huge spike in people Googling sex terms right around Christmas.
But the team also wanted to know what about this holiday made people more aroused. They used Twitter to do a “sentimental analysis,” looking for words associated with emotion (think “love” and “thankful”).
“We found that, around Christmas, people are generally happier and they’re also less anxious and more calm,” said co-author Dr. Luis Rocha, a professor of informatics at Indiana University. “Every time you see these moods arise you see an increase in sex searches on Google.”
The study was done in part to debunk the popular hypothesis that an abundance of September babies could be explained by biological factors, rather than cultural ones. The biology hypothesis suggests the human reproductive cycle is based on Earth’s orbit, and that you’re more likely to conceive around the winter solstice. If so, you would expect people in the southern hemisphere to be more excited about sex in June, when their winter solstice happens. But Rocha says this wasn’t the case at all — the only significant sexGoogling spike happened around Christmas.
“I think we conclusively show it’s not a biological adaptation to the solar cycle because even with Australia and Brazil we see the same holiday effect and they’re in opposite phases at any given time,” he said. “So it can’t be a biological adaptation to fewer hours of sunlight.”
And if that wasn’t enough to put the solar theory to rest, the researchers also found sex interest peaked during Eid al-Fitr, the celebration marking the end of Ramadan. Eid al-Fitr doesn’t fall on the same day each year, yet sex interest shifted according to the holiday.
“This shows how data from social media can actually disprove a hypothesis that was the most well established one in biology,” said Rocha. “Now we just need to find out what the social triggers are that increase biological reproduction around these times.
“I suspect it’s because Christmas is very family-centred and specifically childcentred in terms of gift-giving and the story of baby Jesus,” he said. Christmas also marks the end of a cycle because it’s at the end of the year, so maybe this just makes people feel more calm.”