A study shows that men should wear boxers and sleep naked to keep their sperm healthy
Men’s underwear and the way they hold their bodies have long been thought to affect the quality of their sperm. Now, new research backs up the idea that men should be free and unrestrained in order to have children.
A recent study found that men who wore boxer shorts during the day and nothing to bed had much less DNA damage in their sperm than men who wore tight underwear during the day and at night.
The lead researcher, Katherine Sapra of the US National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, said that the type of underwear men wear during the day and to bed is linked to the quality of their sperm. “Reducing exposure for bed reduces DNA fragmentation. Men who wear boxers during the day but none to bed have better sperm quality parameters.”
Over the course of a year, the study followed 500 men and took note of their underwear choices and the quality of their sperm.
The researchers found that people whose DNA broke up 25% less when they slept naked and wore loose-fitting boxers during the day than when they wore tight underwear like briefs. Even though the study only looked at a small number of men, it shows that being more open-minded about men’s underwear could have big health benefits for their fertility.
“We have known for a long time that men who raise the temperature of their testicles by working in hot places or by wearing tight underwear have lower-quality sperm than men whose testicles are cooler,” said Allan Pacey, a male fertility expert at Sheffield University in the UK who was not involved in the study. “It’s never been shown well enough if men can make things better by changing their underwear, but this study, even though it’s small, goes a long way to show that’s true.”
But future research would be even more helpful if it went beyond just looking at sperm quality and tried to measure the effects of a man’s choice of underwear. “What we really need to find out is whether their partners get pregnant more often or faster than they would have if the men had kept wearing tight underwear,” he said.
But in the meantime, men who want to have kids or who just want to keep their sperm healthy have nothing to lose by wearing looser clothes or even nothing at all, knowing that they may be protecting their ability to have children.
Pacey said, “Changing underwear isn’t really a risky thing to do, so would-be dads might want to buy some looser pants.”
