Many more uniforms were on the list (such as those worn by pilots, sailors, flight attendants, clowns, cowboys and cowgirls, etc.), but none of them scored higher than 2%, and some of them were only cited by a few respondents. It’s interesting that, despite the abundance of porn movies that show people delivering pizza or fixing pipes, fantasies involving these professions were quite rare.

It’s intriguing to consider the top uniforms since many of them—but not all—represent societal roles that denote power or authority, which raises the possibility that people may imagine wearing uniforms to create a dominant-submissive dynamic.

In line with this theory, I discovered that participants dreamt about BDSM scenarios of every kind more frequently the more they thought about having sex with a partner who was in uniform. The strongest correlation that was found, however, was between uniform fantasies and more frequent thoughts about playing a subservient role and engaging in sex with an authoritative figure, which suggests that this is a significant draw for many people.

Of course, there are other possibilities for why costumes and uniforms might show up in someone’s sexual fantasies. For instance, having uniform fantasies was also associated with generally having a hyperactive imagination, which implies that occasionally these thoughts are simply the result of a wandering mind. These dreams were also more frequent in people who were sensation-seekers, indicating that some people find appeal in the thrill of breaking the rules.