NEW YORK – It’s a question that often prompts a boastful answer or a bashful one: How many sex partners have you had? Now the federal government says it has authoritative statistics, documenting that men are far more likely to play the field than women. A new nationwide survey, using high-tech methods to solicit candid answers on sexual activity and illegal drug use, finds that 29 percent of American men report having 15 or more female sexual partners in a lifetime, while only 9 percent of women report having sex with 15 or more men. The median number of lifetime female sexual partners for men was seven; the median number of male partners for women was four. The survey, released Friday, is based on data collected from 1999 to 2002 for the National Center for Health Statistics, a branch of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In previous federal surveys on these topics, participants were asked questions in face-to-face interviews. The CDC believes that caused underreporting of behaviors which might be viewed negatively, although the survey did not provide any comparative results from earlier reports. This time, data was gathered from 6,237 adults, […]