I started studying sex when I was eleven years old...really. My mother helped me form a sex education study group in my basement and I had a five-cent newsletter. It went on for about a year. I got back to it when I went to graduate school at Yale during the rebirth of the women's movement and was a teaching assistant for the first large-lecture sex education classes since Kinsey (taught by Dr. Phil Sarrel). There were so many questions without answers and so many presumptive (rather than empirical) conclusions that I decided to study relationships and sexuality.

Interests & activities:
I'm a horse person, a travel person, and a people person. I spend a good part of my discretionary time on my horse ranch in Snoqualmie, WA, and I travel for both fun and work. I love India, Africa, and any part of France. I like to do small workshops in beautiful places. People are important to me, and I have a wide and diverse circle of friends -- some I've known for 35 years or more, some new. I've recently started to learn how to sail, ski (only occasionally), and in good weather you can often find me in my rather extensive rose or perennial garden getting seriously scratched up! I usually have at least three dogs and multiple horses at any given time. I also like hearing almost any kind of live music, modestly collect art and wine, and enjoy university life -- students and colleagues.

Favorite non-work-related books:
All the President’s Men, The Earth in Balance, A Distant Mirror, Portrait of a Marriage, The Color of Water, Cowboys Are My Weakness, Prince of Tides, The Dogs of Bedlam County, almost anything by Dick Francis, The Black Stallion, Black Boy, The Painted Bird, The Hobbit Trilogy, Cry the Beloved Country, and Lolita.

Favorite movies:
Citizen Kane (I named my ranch after the last word in the movie: “Rosebud”), Gross Point Blank, Witness, Henry, most of the Indiana Jones movies, American Beauty, Elizabeth, When Harry Met Sally, Dancing with Wolves, The Magnificent Seven, High Noon, Casablanca, Out of Africa, The Secretary, Prisoner of Love, Water, Fire, The Body Guard, Pretty Woman, An Officer and a Gentleman, Gigi -- shameless chick flicks but I admit to being hooked. There are so many of them it would take pages more to put them all down.

Favorite TV shows:
CBS News Sunday Morning (I am addicted to it), The Daily Show, Grey's Anatomy, Sex and the City (even in re-runs), Boston Legal, and Saturday Night Live.

Favorite quotes:
"My candle burns at both ends, It will not last the night. But ah my friends, and oh my foes, it gives a lovely light." -- Edna St. Vincent Millay

"Sometimes people change and forget to tell each other." -- Lillian Hellman

displayname
Pepper Schwartz, Ph.D.

professional background
Pepper Schwartz, Ph.D., is currently Schrag Professor of Sociology at the University of Washington in Seattle and lectures nationally and internationally on sexuality, relationships, women's issues, parent/child issues, personal and family well-being in today's world, and communication between men and women in intimate and work relationships. Dr. Schwartz received her doctorate from Yale University, and has dedicated over 35 years of scientific research to the study of compatibility in intimate relationships.

Degrees:
M.A. and Ph.D., Yale University
B.A. and M.A., Washington University

Associations:

• Schrag Professor of Sociology, University of Washington
• President, Scientific Study of Sexuality Society
• President, Pacific Sociological Association
• Chief Relationship Expert, Perfectmatch.com
• Board Chair, Centers for Sexuality, San Francisco State University

Awards:

• Engaging Lecturer and Best Social Science Professor, UW Panhellenic Association, 2007
• Distinguished Alumnus, Washington University in St. Louis, 2006
• 2005 award winner for Public Understanding of Sociology, American Sociological Association
• Woodrow Wilson Fellow, Washington University
• Matrix Award for Achievement in Education
• International Women's Forum Award in Career Achievement, Washington State

Publications:

• Author, Prime: Adventures and Advice on Sex, Love and the Sensual Years
• Author, Talks Parents Must Have With Kids About Sex and Character (with Dominick Cappello)
• Author, Everything You Know About Love and Sex is Wrong
• Author, Finding Your Perfect Match
• Author, The Love Text (with Virginia Rutter)
• Author, 201 Questions to Ask Your Parents: 201 Questions to Ask Your Kids
• Author, American Couples: Money, Work and Sex
• Author, Gender and Intimate Relationships (with Barbara Risman)
• Author, The Gender of Sexuality
• Author, What I Learned About Sex (with Debra Haffner)
• Author, The Lifetime Book of Love and Sex Quizzes
• Author, The Great Sex Weekend
• Author, Women at Yale (with Janet Lever)
• Author, Love Between Equals: How Peer Marriage Really Works
• Past Columnist, Glamour, The New York Times, American Baby magazine
• Columnist, Lifetimetv.com, Kiss.com, PerfectMatch.com, Classmates.com
• Author of 15 books on sex, marriage, relationships, and child/parent relations; translated to Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Spanish, Portuguese, Swedish, Croatian, Czech, and German.