The Student Health Advisory Committee was forced to push Sex Week back from its ordinary time during Valentine’s Week to early April after confusion surrounding keynote speakers’ availability, but the week turned out much better than had been earlier anticipated.

SHAC had initially hoped to bring author Mary Roach, known for her writings on anatomy, to campus as the keynote speaker for Sex Week and received funding for her visit. However, SHAC was not able to work out a date for Roach’s visit, and Sex Week was pushed to later in the semester.

The second choice for keynote speaker was Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist from Rutgers University, who spoke on Friday night about her research into the biological basis behind the drives for love, attachment and sex.

From her extensive research as the chief scientific advisor for the website Chemistry.com, Fisher concluded that there are four distinct personality types when it comes to love: the explorer, the builder, the director and the negotiator. Each personality type is determined by a neurotransmitter—specifically, which neurotransmitter has the most dominant presence in a given individual. For example, “explorers” are high in dopamine, are characterized by the use of words like “adventure” and “new” in their online dating bios and tend to seek other explorers.

Students found the week to be enlightening and were especially excited about learning the biological basis behind romantic love.

“I got to know some of the scientific side of romance and relationships, and I think that’s pretty useful,” junior Chengyu Liu said.

While a panel of porn stars was the key event of last year’s Sex Week, the combination of a negative reaction from alumni to last year’s panel and a desire to focus on other aspects of sex led SHAC to choose non-porn-based programming for this year’s Sex Week. Sophomore Leah Strickman, co-chair of the Sex Week Committee, however, said that SHAC might be open to hosting a porn-related event in future Sex Weeks.

Other events held during Sex Week included a discussion of alternative methods of contraception by the Contraceptive CHOICE Project and a panel discussing hookups and consent, hosted by Alpha Delta Phi and the Committee Organized for Rape Education. A “sexpert” answered anonymous questions regarding lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender sexual health and social concerns at Pride Alliance’s “Sex In and Out of the Closet.”

“What was really interesting was seeing different people coming to different events and seeing the range of sexuality expressed on campus and seeing how different people have different interests—it’s not all about hookup culture,” sophomore and Sex Week committee member Robert Kapeller said.

After the keynote event, Fisher was happy to give advice to students looking for love.

“Never give up,” Fisher said. “I asked on Match.com, ‘Have you ever fallen in madly in love with someone who you originally didn’t find at all attractive?’ And 35 percent of people said ‘yes.’ So you’ve got to give people a chance.”

Although she is not in charge of next year’s Sex Week, Strickman said she expected the event to return to its usual February date.

The February date “makes sense in terms of being around Valentine’s Day, and it’s a little bit better—the time in the semester is less crazy.” Strickman said. “You have more time to devote to making sure everything is okay.”

With additional reporting by Manvitha Marni.