Science Says You're Likely To Overshare Your Deepest, Darkest Secrets After Sex

So you met this guy at the bar, and 12 hours and about five shots later, he's already been inside you three times.

The logical part of your brain knows he's just a one-night stand, but for some reason, you REALLY want to tell him about the night you lost your virginity to your high school boyfriend.

So here you are, bearing your soul to a (kind of) total stranger, and hours later, you're feeling MORTIFIED.

But don't fret — it's totally normal! A new study, published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, found that just the mere thought of sex makes you more likely to voluntarily overshare your personal information.

The research came from three separate studies. In the first two studies, researchers split participants in two groups. In the first study, each group was shown either a subliminal sexual image or a neutral image.

In the second study, participants were exposed to videos that were either more obvious with their intentions, including a sex scene from a movie, or a not-so-steamy informational video about cats. Afterward, the groups from each study were asked to share a personal or embarrassing story with someone of the opposite sex.

In both of these studies, researchers found that even thinking about sex (regardless of whether or not you even realized you were exposed to anything sexual) made you more likely to reveal something personal.

Researchers found that even thinking about sex (regardless of whether or not you even realized you were exposed to anything sexual) made you more likely to reveal something personal.

Then, there was a third study, which required couples to watch either a video of other couples having sex or a video of couples being intimate but not sexual.

After participants then shared their personal stories with someone of the opposite sex, participants were asked to rate how deep they got with those personal stories and whether or not they would go on a first date with that person.

It turns out, people who watched more openly sexual videos were not only more likely to overshare, but they were also more likely to pursue a relationship with that person than members of the other group were.

It turns out, people who watched more openly sexual videos were not only more likely to overshare, but they were also more likely to pursue a relationship than members of the other group were.

And the madness doesn't just stop with blurting TMI stories when you're done having sex. No, we also tend to feel closer to our one-night stands after oversharing, and as a result, we feel a stronger desire to keep things going (i.e. to press "send" on that embarrassing drunk text two weeks later).

The reason for this totally uncool psychological phenomenon has everything to do with evolution.

We are (unfortunately) biologically programmed to want to feel close to the people we've had sex particularly because we want to get to know the future father of our children.

Yup.

As I'm sure you know, having sex CAN result in having babies. Back in the day, having a partner was just easier when it came to raising kids. And evolution made it so we would want to bond and maintain relationships with the potential parents of our potential children.

Even though we're modern women who are more than capable of raising children on our own, our bodies still hang on to that primal need to form a bond with the possible father of our babies.

UGH, THANKS FOR SALTING MY GAME, EVOLUTION.

*eye roll*

Citations: Sex makes you think oversharing is a good idea (Mashable), Sex Unleashes Your Tongue (Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin), Unleash the Tongue: The Effect of Sex on Self-Disclosure (Science of Relationships)