Scientific personality study explores what drives sexual imagination

But those who are relatively conscientious or agreeable fantasize less often, suggest the findings.

The personality trait study found that people with a relatively neurotic personality report having more frequent sexual fantasies.

Co-author Emily Cannoot, of Michigan State University in the US, said: "Prior research suggests that sexual fantasies are common and might benefit people’s happiness and relationships.

"A deeper understanding of links between people’s personality characteristics, how often they have sexual fantasies, and what they tend to fantasize about could help inform efforts by clinicians and mental health professionals to improve sexual well-being.

"However, few studies have explored potential links between personality traits and sexual fantasies."

Cannoot and her colleagues analysed data from 5,225 American adults who completed two questionnaires.

The first captured overall frequency of fantasizing as well as frequency of fantasizing about certain themes, which fell into four broad categories.

These were exploratory - including the theme “participating in an orgy”; intimate - including “making love outdoors in a romantic setting”; impersonal - including “watching others have sex”; or sadomasochistic - including “being forced to do something."

The second questionnaire captured the widely accepted "big five" personality traits: extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, neuroticism, and open-mindedness.

It also assessed subcomponents of the big five; for example, depression or anxiety as facets of neuroticism, and compassion or respectfulness as facets of agreeableness.

Statistical analysis of the data showed that people who scored high in conscientiousness and agreeableness reported less frequent sexual fantasizing across all four categories.

When the research team took a closer look, they found that the results were primarily driven by respectfulness and responsibility.

Meanwhile, people with a high neuroticism score, in particular those with more depressive personalities, reported more frequent sexual fantasies.

No significant associations were seen between extraversion or open-mindedness and frequency of sexual fantasies.

The team said their findings, published in the journal PLOS One, held true across the four different categories of fantasies.

Co-author Professor William Chopik said: “One implication of the current work is that individual differences in personality might be useful in predicting variation in sexual fantasy frequencies, although they are not wholly redundant with each other - and some associations are relatively small or modest."

He added: "Knowing these associations further advances the predictive power of personality while showing that variation in sexual fantasies is common.”