The Hook Up

If you've been watching the Bachelorette chances are you've had a conversation about being too emotionally intense early on in the relationship. It can come off as needy and clingy and is probably the best way to freak someone out, but if you really like someone, how can you help showing it? And don’t people want to be showered in affection?

According to a new study, young men get more emotional satisfaction out of “bromances”—close, heterosexual friendships with other males—than they do out of romantic relationships with women.

On the pod we’re looking at the 'bromance'. What is it, what they mean to you and what the concept of bromances says about how we see male friendship. Coming up you’ll hear from relationships counsellor Clinton Power on why these relationships are important, and from masculinity expert Dr Michael Flood on why close hetero male relationships have been stigmitised, and why they’re becoming more acceptable.

Have you gone down on someone with a vulva before? How do you know if you're doing it right? If you're receiving, how can you communicate what you want? On the podcast, we're doing a deep dive on the muff dive with sex therapist Giverny Lewis.

Dating can be hard enough as it is, but when you’re spending hours on end swiping and chatting to people you might not ever meet, how does it affect our mental health? You’ll hear from Dr Mitchell Hobbs on how these apps play us and how they’re making money off our FOMO on meeting our dream partner. And clinical psychologist Malinda Guest talks us through how dating apps can be detrimental to our mental health, and how they can help us feel better about dating.

Hugh Hefner recently died at the age of 91, leaving behind a huge legacy with Playboy. But what kind of a legacy did he leave? Was Hef responsible for the sexual revolution or in embracing sexuality, did he actually take women’s sexuality backwards?.

When you’re in your twenties, making decisions about having kids might not be one of your top priorities, but for some people it’s something that they’ve already made their mind up on. So what’s it like dating when you or someone you’re seeing definitely doesn’t want kids.

No one likes talking about scabies or crabs, but it turns out they’re probably more common than you think. On the podcast we’ll chat to Dr Brad McKay on how we get scabies and crabs, what they are and how we can get rid of them. We also put a call into former triple j breakfast host Tom Ballard who had a scabies experience of his own.

On an individual basis we can't really control who turns us on, but when it comes to studies that have been done on our preferences in general when on dating apps, it reveals some racial biases that many of us have, but are probably afraid to admit. You’ll hear from Dr Denton Callender, a research fellow at the Kirby Institute on how apps contribute to racial preferences, and Dr Ian Stephen might have an explanation as to why we’re more likely to end up with someone of the same race. We also asked sociologist Zuleyka Zevallos where these ethnic preferences might come from.

Have you ever woken up from a really vivid sex dream about someone and thought “have I just cheated on my partner??”. On the podcast we’re looking at sex dreams and what they mean. You’ll hear from a couple of people who broke up with their partners because of a sex dream, and from dream interpreter Jane Teresa Anderson about what these dreams mean – she also has a warning about acting on your dreams too…

Premature ejaculation can ruin your sex life and your relationships. A few months ago we chatted to Jonno about his problem with premature ejaculation. It’s been a few months now so we decided to check in with him again and see how he’s going. Hosted by James Findlay