The elevator felt like it was swaying.

Maya pressed the buttons for her floor—and then his.

“You should come. Come to floor 9,” Jack said with a tipsy grin. It was part buzz, part flirtation. They both leaned slightly, their heads tilted toward one another, unsteady from the night.

“One too many” didn’t quite cover it. Maya could practically hear her conscience speaking: Help him get to his floor. Then go to yours.

But when the elevator doors finally opened, Maya was lying on her back.

All she had wanted was to celebrate finishing finals with her classmates. Jack, on the other hand, wasn’t ready for the night to end. They had mutual friends but had never really hung out outside of class.

They kissed. It was the kind of kiss that lingers in your mind, the kind you know is good while it’s happening. But something didn’t sit right.

It felt like I was watching from outside myself. I saw my body kiss him, but I wasn’t really there. My thoughts, my emotions—they were somewhere else. I felt split, disconnected.

Since that night, Maya and Jack haven’t spoken.

The brain and body disconnect

The lie: A hookup = increases confidence and is stress-free.

What Maya experienced that night is similar to what others experience on college campuses and beyond. These situations often occur after first dates and even after the occasional late-night phone call.

Approximately three-quarters of sexually active college students report at least some regret over past sexual experiences. This could manifest itself as guilt, embarrassment, or shame.

In addition to sexual regret, casual sex with multiple partners is associated with psychological distress, including anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, and reduced life satisfaction.

Bondage outside the bedroom: Emotional, spiritual, and physical

The lie: A hookup = no strings-attached pleasure.

The physical bondage we hear about most often and with good reason. Sex with multiple partners leads to cancer, STDs, and, if you are not ready to be a parent, a child. We also hear of soul ties where you are spiritually bonded with the other, taking on their emotional and spiritual baggage. Hookups are positioned as freeing and easy, except they are anything but. 

Oxytocin is released during sex, otherwise known as the bonding hormone. For women, we become more emotionally attached (we release more of this hormone compared to men), and for men, oxytocin rises after ejaculation. This creates a biochemical response that affects how we see our partner. While women are often shamed for being attached to their partner after a hookup, your hormones are the reason you can’t truly let go or get closure. 

TikTok user @saharrooo explains this concept in a viral video:

“The problem is that guys tend to lead girls on because they want to keep getting what they want, which is a hookup. And the girls are painted out to be clingy, obsessive, or psycho because they catch feelings. Realistically, it should be understandable to catch feelings because you’re doing something so intimate.”

Once you have sex, biology pushes you for further bonding with that person, regardless of outer circumstances.

There’s a chance you will enter a relationship or continue hooking up based on hormones, not compatibility. Those intense feelings can be confused for intimacy because we are hardwired to connect.

The orgasm gap

The lie: A hookup = equality and empowerment.

The gender orgasm gap tells a different story.

Study after study confirms that across both casual hookups and committed relationships, men are significantly more likely to reach orgasm than women. While men often approach casual sex with a recreational mindset, women tend to seek relational and emotional connection—even when they enter a hookup trying to suppress that instinct.

This imbalance matters. It’s not just about pleasure—though that’s part of it—it’s about the deeper reality that casual sex tends to prioritize male gratification at the expense of female emotional and physical well-being. The data backs this up: women report far higher satisfaction, both sexually and emotionally, within committed relationships. In fact, couples who waited until marriage to have sex report 20% higher relationship satisfaction, better communication, a 22% lower likelihood of divorce, and significantly higher sexual fulfillment.

In that light, sleeping around isn’t liberating—it’s self-sabotage disguised as empowerment. It asks women to suppress their natural desire for connection in order to mimic a shallow caricature of masculinity. But true masculinity protects and honors; it doesn’t use and discard.

The truth? Hookup culture is designed to backfire. Especially for women.

Everybody’s doing it (literally)

The lie: I don’t participate in hookup culture = I’m not affected.

David Rangel is an assistant professor of Education at Brown. He teaches an entire class devoted to unpacking hookup culture within three weeks. Rangel says, “People think that everybody is hooking up because nobody really knows what it means.”

Since people think everyone is doing it, a pressure looms, even if you are not participating. 

The idea of wanting to be wanted and showing others that you are wanted through sex can often spur those on the fence to participate. It’s the idea that casual sex is an acceptable and encouraged way to receive validation. We hear of the walk of shame, but now there’s a reverse shame— the embarrassment of not having great sex, or sex period, means you are somehow less valued.

While TikTokker @iyanamare never participated in hookup culture, she felt the pressure. 

She says, “As a woman in her early twenties, I feel like we are dangerously oversexualized. Honestly, it’s not progressive or beneficial for us at all. I feel a lot of women are brainwashed into thinking that they benefit from having sex or playing a game as a man plays it.”

Our culture often equates a woman’s desirability and femininity with sexuality, and that’s where it stops. Sexual promiscuity is a band-aid for actually addressing women’s complex inner lives and what true equality and championing women looks like. 

Sexuality can enhance and point to the dignity of the human person, but a hookup reduces someone to a sexual object. A means to an end. The end being validation, pleasure, escape from loneliness, etc. 

Mare continues, “This is coming from somebody who used to oversexualize herself on the internet. This is coming from somebody who lost her virginity at 20 and thought that was too old. I can definitely tell you I wish I had waited, and I hope you guys continue to wait if you’re still a virgin.”

No strings attached, just knots.

The lie: A hookup = a one-time thing with less drama.

Hookup partners are often casual friends or acquaintances. So, leaving someone behind after the hookup is actually not as easy as it seems. 

This 2018 study found that 53.5% of individuals who reported engaging in extramarital sex did so with a close personal friend, while 29.4% did so with a neighbor, coworker, or long-term acquaintance. Ironically, the no-strings attached mentality that comes with casual sex actually relies on pre-existing relationships.

These statistics show that many individuals prefer engaging in casual sex with people they know, due to factors like trust, comfort, and emotional connection.  

Relationships with hookup partners as well as non-hookup friends can be negatively impacted by these sexual encounters. It’s hard to discard someone or end things after changing the entire dynamic of your relationship, especially when you interact with them on a daily basis. This creates distrust between people, broken friendships, and confusion for all involved. On top of it all, you’re told to shut down those emotions after engaging in deep physical and emotional intimacy, because it was just a hookup. 

The lie: I can stop whenever I want to.

You are more likely to continue “hooking up” with multiple partners after being sexually active repeatedly with multiple people. 

The habits you make end up shaping the lifestyle that you live. A hookup is the gateway to consistent casual sex. This study shows that among 483 young females, the ones who had hooked up before entering college were the ones to consistently hookup in the future.
When you have sex with someone, you rewire your brain through a hormonal cocktail of dopamine and oxytocin. It can be understandably difficult to break this pattern, but resources like Magdala ministries can help.

Sexual exploration or exploitation?

The lie: A hookup = sexual freedom and exploration.

Hookup culture can normalize use and abuse. More than 70% of rape and nonconsentual sex happens within the context of a hookup.

With hookup culture, we are told to dive in without listening to our bodies and minds. 

After these types of encounters, individuals experience a range of emotions. This can lead to a skepticism of traditional relationships for fear of emotional and physical safety. 

Lisa Wade, the author of American Hookup, sums it up like this: 

“Hookup culture, strongly masculinized, demands carelessness, rewards callousness, and punishes kindness.”

While some men may believe they are keeping their options open while hooking up for “the one,” they are distancing themselves from the possibility of real commitment. Repeated hookups train your brain for novelty and self-gratification rather than the virtue required for true love. 

True masculinity isn’t the pursuit of instant gratification for one night and regret in the morning, but the ability to love, act, and protect selflessly. 

To combat this shallow idea of masculinity, Wade believes we need “practices that enhance sexual encounters— communication, creativity, tolerance, confidence and knowledge.” 

Good thing there’s a sacrament for that!

The truth behind intimacy, sex, and connection

Clinical sexologist and psychotherapist Kristie Overstreet defines intimacy as connection.

Overstreet defines trust as feeling safe with your partner and confident that they’ll treat you well, keep their promises, and care for the relationship. Trust and intimacy go hand in hand—when one falters, the other usually does too.

So what happens when there’s no trust, rising uncertainty, and zero emotional connection? You get a hookup. From a scientific perspective, sex in that context is never going to satisfy on a physiological level.

Emotional and sexual intimacy are inherently linked—whether we like it or not.

Overstreet argues that intimacy goes far beyond physical contact. So while a hookup may succeed in its immediate goal, it actually undermines the deeper connection sex is meant to foster. Repeated casual encounters can dull a person’s ability to form genuine emotional bonds, especially in future relationships that require vulnerability and trust.

Hookup culture encourages emotional detachment, framing it as casual or carefree. But that very detachment makes it harder to talk openly about consent, boundaries, or emotional needs, let alone love.

In contrast, marriage offers a space where sex becomes a true self-gift. It honors the whole person—emotionally, spiritually, and physically—in a context of safety, commitment, and dignity.

Moral responsibility

Ironically, hookup culture makes a strong case for saving sex for marriage, for committed relationships, and for monogamy.

Popularized through college campuses, dating apps, movies, and media, the hookup is now a fixture of modern life—whether we like it or not. But the real question isn’t just is it wrong? It’s what is it doing to us? And more importantly, how do we resist it and live differently in a culture that treats sex as casual?

To live counterculturally, we must reject the idea of using others as a means to an end. Real love starts with respect—for the whole person, body and soul.

As C.S. Lewis famously said, “There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal… It is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit.”

If we truly believe that, then casual sex stops being casual. And real love becomes the only thing worth pursuing.