Older adults may remain sexually interested and capable into their 90s.

To analyze the contributors to sexual unwellness (SU) and to explore the latent constructs that can work as major determinants in SU for a cross-national older community-dwelling population, and to analyze the explanatory mechanisms of a SU model, in an older cross-national sample.

A socio-demographic and health questionnaires were completed, assessing participants’ background information. Interviews were completed, focused on the contributors to SU. Complete data were available for 109 English and Portuguese older adults, aged between 65–87 years (M = 71.6, SD = 6.95). Data was subjected to content analysis. Representation of the associations and latent constructs were analyzed by a Multiple Correspondence Analysis.

The most frequent response of these participants was ‘lack of intimacy and affection’ (25.1%) whereas ‘poor sexual health’ was the least referred indicator of SU (11.2%) A two-dimension model formed by ‘poor affection, intimacy and sexual health’, and ‘poor general health and financial instability’ was presented as a best-fit solution for English older adults. SU for Portuguese older adults were explained by a two-factor model: ‘daily hassles and health issues’, ‘poor intimacy and financial instability’.

These outcomes uncovered the perspective of older adults concerning SU and the need of including these factors when considering the sexual well-being of older samples.

The authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.