The National Social Life, Health and Aging Project (NSHAP) released its first findings this week, with a press conference on Monday and a scholarly paper published in the August 23, 2007 New England Journal of Medicine.  The findings about sexual activity and health in older American adults garnered front page coverage in USA Today, the New York Times,  and the Chicago Tribune, and prominent coverage in the  Washington Post,  CNN, Los Angeles Times, Canada's Globe and Mail, NBC's Today Show and NBC Nightly News,  MSN, FoxNews, WebMD, and MediLexicon.  A syndicated story by the Associated Press (AP) was published widely, including by NPR,  CBS News, ABC News, MSNBC, the San Diego Union Tribune, and Canada's C-Health. Reuters also published a syndicated story.

The NSHAP study is the first comprehensive, nationally representative study of sexuality and health in older Americans.  With funding from the National Institute on Aging, NORC and the University of Chicago collaborated to produce this dataset, which principal investigator and Linda J. Waite describes as a 'goldmine' of information that will  help seniors and policymakers fill a gap in the knowledge about sexuality in older adults and its link to overall health.  Universityof Chicago's Stacy Tessler Lindau, MD and NORC chairman Edward O. Laumann co-authored the NEJM paper with Waite and all three participated in the press conference.

Data collection for the survey employed new methods, using more than 130 field interviewers to collect biological specimens (biomarkers) such as blood, saliva, and vaginal self-swabs, and other physical measures of health (biomeasures) sucheight, and waist size, from survey respondents. Many others played important roles in the questionnaire and sample design, interviewing protocols and virtually all other aspects of the survey. 

To learn more, view the official press release on the University of Chicago News Office site, read the paper, and visit the project page.