History Main / ExperimentedInCollege

** In a ''WesternAnimation/BeautyAndTheBeast'' parody, Kristen Wiig's Belle is getting confused about how sexual attraction works with the anthropomorphic household objects. The clock says he's attracted to women. The candelabra says he's attracted only to candelabras but one time in college, he dates a menorah.

* ''Series/DarkDesire'': Zoe sleeping with her best friend Karina (a lesbian) at first seems to be this, since after it she concludes she's straight. However, in Season 2 they're dating. When Zoe cheats on her by having sex with a guy though, Karina thinks that it was just experimental for her, to get over Dario. Zoe [[SubvertedTrope denies this though]], saying she's really been attracted to girls so long as she can remember, but also likes guys.

* ''Webcomic/MenageA3'': Late-introduced character Peggy invokes the trope [[http://www.ma3comic.com/strips-ma3/pretend_this_is_college here]]. She subsequently says that she concluded that she just prefers men, but she clearly doesn't regret the experiment, and the presence of [[EvenTheGirlsWantHer sex goddess [=DiDi=]]] makes her quite happy to revert for an evening.

[[folder:Video Games]]
* In ''VideoGame/PillarsOfEternityIIDeadfire'', you can encounter the Elf courtesan Ymir, and it turns him and Elf party member Aloth, had a fling in while they were studying magic in their college days. While Ymir is quite happy to see Aloth again, his dialogue implying that Aloth was something of a ClosetKey for him, Aloth, while not hostile to Ymir, is clearly somewhat embarrassed with the situation and tries to downplay the whole thing and deflect questions about it. [[spoiler:The fact that Aloth's female SplitPersonality, Iselmyr, chimes in and strongly implies that it was in fact ''her'' that actually seduced Ymir, goes some way to explain Aloth's discomfort with the situation. Iselmyr was the one that wanted to do the dirty with Ymir and Aloth was just along for the ride, whether he liked it or not.]]

* ''Fanfic/InterpretiveStepsForANewTango'': Bruno used to experiment with other guys when he was younger by masturbating together and occasionally helping each other out, but he still considered himself straight because he thought of only girls while doing it until he met [[ClosetKey Pablo]]. Pablo, on the other hand, never experimented with other guys because he knew/feared deep down that he would enjoy it more than he was "supposed" to.

* WebOriginal/FortniteLoreSociety: The Mad FN Scientist confirmed that he wanted to be transgender when he was 13 (And even practiced cross-dressing), but grew out of it a month later.

* In ''ComicBook/ScottPilgrim'', Ramona experimented with her roommate Roxanne, who became the fourth Evil Ex when she ended it.

* In the "Green Inferno" storyline in ''ComicBook/TheAuthority'', the renegade (and bluntly homophobic) ex-Doctor disdainfully challenges the team with the phrase "Poofs first." It's presumably aimed at the canonically gay Apollo and The Midnighter, but the Engineer steps forward with a cool:
-->'''Engineer:''' Does a lesbian fling in college count, Doctor?

* ''Franchise/WonderWoman'': The kreel, whose Sangtee Empire Diana fights in [[ComicBook/WonderWoman1987 Vol 2]], have an interesting take as heterosexual relations are highly illegal and women are considered revolting by the ruling class. This does not prevent women kreel from existing or having romantic relations, they just have to present themselves as and publicly identify as men to take part in society as adults which makes any teenage romances they had flings by necessity since they can no longer use their feminine identity.
* In ''ComicBook/{{Grendel}}'', Crystal Kennedy has a sexual relationship with her ButchLesbian [[LimaSyndrome prison guard]] Susan Veraghen, but after a while, she drags Susan unwillingly into a three-way relationship with a man and finally dumps her altogether in favour of the kind of political marriage that Susan thought she was rescuing her from.
* America Chavez is an inversion when she appears in ''ComicBook/YoungAvengers'': she identifies as lesbian and dismisses her earlier relationship with a male teammate while she was in the Teen Brigade as an experiment that she didn't enjoy much.
* In the erotic graphic novel ''Teach Me!'' by Enrique Villagran, one of the female teachers is complimented on her skill in cunnilingus; especially as she claims to have never had a lesbian experience. She then admits that "There was this one summer, in college..."

* ''Fanfic/InterpretiveStepsForANewTango'': Bruno used to experiment with other guys when he was younger by masturbating together and occasionally helping each other out, but he still considered himself straight because he thought of only girls while doing it until he met [[ClosetKey Pablo]]. Pablo, on the other hand, never experimented with other guys because he knew/feared deep down that he would enjoy it more than he was "supposed" to.

[[folder:Film]]
* There's an awkward conversation in ''Film/FourWeddingsAndAFuneral'' that ends with this:
-->'''Fiona:''' I was a lesbian once at school, but only for about 15 minutes.
* Discussed in ''Film/{{PCU}}'' where the Pit's leader tells the prospective freshmen that college in the 1990s is different from the old days where they "swill sherry and screw goats for fun."
* Within ''Film/DefinitelyMaybe'', the diary Emily gives Will to return to Summer shows that they had an experimental relationship in school.
* This is intimated in ''Film/FourChristmases'' after Kate's sister tells Brad about the bullying Kate went through during their childhood.
-->"My husband and I tell each other all our embarrassing secrets. He knows I slept with the entire water polo team in college, just like I know he experimented with men."
* Reverend Frank alludes to this in ''Film/LicenseToWed''.

* In ''Film/ScottPilgrimVsTheWorld'', Ramona experimented with her roommate Roxanne, who became the fourth Evil Ex when she ended it.
--> '''Ramona:''' I was just a little bi-curious. \\
'''Roxanne:''' Well, honey, I'm ''a little BI-FURIOUS!''
* ''Film/CassanovaWasAWoman'': Evette, after learning Cassanova's dating a woman, relates she once had kissed her best friend in college and nearly had sex with her. Cassanova is unimpressed by this in terms of her lesbian experience.
* ''Film/HollySleptOver'': Audrey tells Noel she had a fling with Holly in college. Though she says it was an experiment for her, it turns out she'd fallen in love with Holly.

* ''Series/MelissaAndJoey'': It's implied that Mel may have experimented with bisexuality in college when Lennox pretends to be a lesbian.

* ''Series/WillAndGrace'':
** Will hires a maid to clean up after Grace...
--->'''Will:''' Grace, this is gonna cheer you up.\\
'''Grace:''' A short brunette woman? Come on, Will, I tried that in college, remember? It really wasn't my thing.
** In another episode, Grace is trying to hide from her boyfriend and ends up ducking behind Karen. In doing so, she knocks Karen off balance, and Karen ends up bent over a table. From Karen:
--->'''Karen:''' Grace, I've told you before, I only did this once in college, and it just so I could borrow her Halston skirt.
** In fact, Karen frequently makes jokes about this, implying things so often it eventually stops being college experimentation and becomes her simply being AmbiguouslyBi. In another episode, when acting as a magician's assistant for Jack, when he tells her to climb in the magic box, she quips, "I haven't done this since my senior year at Sarah Lawrence."
* ''Series/{{Friends}}'':
** In one episode, Rachel claims that she kissed one of her sorority sisters, only Phoebe doesn't believe her. In the end, it turns out to be true (and the woman in question is still in love with her).
** Inverted in another episode. Phoebe's CitizenshipMarriage husband is an ice dancer who everyone (including himself) ''thought'' was gay. It turns out he's really straight.
--->'''Duncan:''' Well, I've never told you this but, there were one or two times, back in college, when I'd get really drunk, go to a straight bar and wake up with a woman next to me. But I, I, I told myself it was the liquor and everyone experiments in college.
* Invoked in an episode of ''Series/GameOfThrones'', Tywin Lannister discusses a proposed marriage between Cersei and the extremely gay Loras Tyrell with Loras' grandmother. When Tywin refers to Loras' homosexuality as an "affliction", Lady Tyrell calmly asks him if he and another boy ever "[had] a go at each other under the sheets" when he was young and is genuinely surprised when Tywin flat out denies it.

* This is how Angela's relationship with Roxie started out on ''Series/{{Bones}}''. Then she went back to mostly guys, then to Roxie for a while after the wedding fiasco, then back to Hodgins.
* Subverted on ''Series/DharmaAndGreg'', when Dharma "comes in" to her mother, admitting she's never had a lesbian experience.
* Inverted in ''Series/SpinCity'':
-->'''Stuart:''' You're gay, right?\\
'''Carter:''' Except for one time in college when I was drunk.
* Eric tried to invoke this in an episode of ''Series/BoyMeetsWorld'', flirting with a pretty college student while [[ItMakesSenseInContext dressed as a woman]]. "Oh, come on, everyone experiments in college!"

* A ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' skit in which ''everyone'' at The Daily Planet is aware of Clark Kent's true identity has Lois, Jimmy, and Perry tormenting the clueless man by making comments about Superman, including speculating that he's gay. Kent furiously defends himself, insisting, "Superman isn't gay! I mean, sure he experimented a little back in Smallville. . .", shocking the other three, who were just making things up.
* On ''Series/FreshMeat'', J.P. and his public school fellows apparently got up to all sorts of stuff that seriously stretches the concept of GayBravado. He talks about it with Giles, who to J.P.'s horror later turns out to actually be gay.
-->'''Giles''': Come on, all the "power showers"... when you think about it, it was pretty gay.\\
'''JP''': What's gay about it?\\
'''Giles''': What, two men wanking each other off?\\
'''JP''': Don't call it ''that''!
* On ''Series/HouseOfCardsUS'', Frank is revealed to have had a relationship in college with a male classmate. The man himself seems to wave the affair off as just experimentation by commenting 'we were just fooling around,' but Frank himself disagrees and lovingly says 'I was drawn to you', claiming that when he feels attraction to someone that's what happens, implying that he's bi. His sexuality is further proven in season 2 when he and his wife have a threesome together with his male bodyguard.
* ''Series/HowIMetYourMother'':
** Lily discusses that one of her lifelong dreams back in college was having a "lesbian experience". Robin kisses her to check it off her list.
** Inverted for laughs where Barney refers to his gay brother James as having had an embarrassing "hetero college phase" that he decided not to mention in his best man's speech. In some of Barney's flashbacks to his own early 20s, the audience gets to see James during his overcompensating phase. He wears nothing buts sports jerseys and gives his brother sex advice about how ''everybody'' finds (hetero) sex gross, but you just do it because it's what is expected of you as a man.
* In ''Series/LastWeekTonightWithJohnOliver'', John finishes his segment on student loans by imploring his college-age viewers to enjoy their time at college, including having some gay experiences.
-->'''John:''' It doesn't count!
* On the season two finale of ''Series/VeronicaMars'', Veronica has a dream of what her graduation from high school would have been like if Lilly hadn't been murdered. Lilly, who is a year older, tells Veronica her relationship with her college boyfriend went south after a "disagreement about fooling around with his ex." Veronica assumes it was the boyfriend doing the fooling around, but Lilly corrects her:
-->'''Lilly:''' Oh, no no, it was um, it was me. I kinda fooled around with his ex. I mean, you'd think that [[GirlOnGirlIsHot guys would dig that, right?]] ...What? It's college, it's expected. You'll see.
* In one ''Series/ParksAndRecreation'' episode where Leslie is convinced by a computer matchmaker that she and Tom are soulmates, she tries to tempt him into being interested in her by admitting that she kissed a girl when she was in college. [[GirlOnGirlIsHot It works, a little.]]

* ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'': In a Beauty and the Beast parody, Kristen Wiig's Belle is getting confused about how sexual attraction works with the anthropomorphic household objects. The clock says he's attracted to women. The candelabra says he's attracted only to candelabras but one time in college, he dates a menorah.
* Creator/{{Ellen DeGeneres}} parodied this on her eponymous talk show.
-->"I experimented with heterosexuality in high school, who didn't?"
* ''Series/AccordingToJim'': When Jim and Cheryl accidentally learn that a couple they're friends with use "Little Winston" as a nickname for the man's penis during sex, Jim tries to balance out the humiliation they feel when they find this out by telling them an equally embarrassing secret of his -- that he experimented with a guy in college. Given how he and Cheryl initially can't agree on the name of the guy, he's probably lying... but he ''does'' say after the couple leaves that he misses him.
* ''Series/DarkDesire'': Zoe sleeping with her best friend Karina (a lesbian) at first seems to be this, since after it she concludes she's straight. However, in Season 2 they're dating. When Zoe cheats on her by having sex with a guy though, Karina thinks that it was just experimental for her, to get over Dario. Zoe [[SubvertedTrope denies this though]], saying she's really been attracted to girls so long as she can remember, but also likes guys.
* Averted in ''Series/Batwoman2019'' when Sophie Moore admits to her husband Tyler that she had a lesbian relationship with Kate Kane in the military academy. Tyler demands to know how long this relationship lasted, and when told it lasted three years, he points out that's longer than any previous relationship he had before meeting Sophie.
-->'''Tyler:''' What was it between you two? And don't say it was just some drunk college hookup unless you were actually drunk for three years.

* In ''Webcomic/{{Fans}}'', Shanna mentions that she and Kathryn were Lesbians-Until-Graduation and were even a couple at one point. After having conflicting feelings at the sight of Kathryn with Will, Shanna [[GreenEyedEpiphany wonders if she might still be attracted to her]]... [[spoiler: until she realizes it's ''Will'' she's jealous over.]]

* In the ''Website/{{CollegeHumor}}'' sketch, "FriendsWithBenefits Wedding," several men that Courtney has been with [[SpeakNowOrForeverHoldYourPeace object to]] her becoming Raymond's FWB because she is (or has been) ''their'' FWB...and one girl speaks up and says she is too, explaining that "She was curious."
** In [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQzFJDgwaCw another sketch]], Jessica, Grant, and [[MadScientist Claus]] reminisce about how they experimented in college. They all realized they liked both men and women, Grant had an orgy, Jessica tried drugs and cheated on her first boyfriend, and [[BreadEggsMilkSquick Claus conducted many experiments which defied the laws of God and Man]].
-->'''Claus''': I sewed the head of a Great Dane to the body of a man, and now the dog-man terrorizes villages in the Swiss Alps. Do I regret it? No. Did I learn from it? After four to five new tries, yeah, now I have a loyal beast-man to do my bidding.

* Lampshaded in ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'', as Chef proclaims that "There's a time and a place for everything, and it's called 'college'."
* ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'': In "Partial Terms of Endearment", it's revealed that Lois once experimented with her college roommate, Naomi.

* On ''WesternAnimation/RobotChicken'', the "My Stalker" sketch has commercial jingles for various inappropriate parodies of the "My Buddy" dolls popular in TheEighties. One of them is "My Friend I Once Experimented with at Summer Camp":
-->My friend I once experimented with at summer camp, My friend I once experimented with at summer camp\\
Though you think of me night and day, I'm not the one who made you gay,\\
My friend I once experimented with at summer camp and me!\\

Maybe it's because young people are living independent of their parents, maybe it's the abundance of booze and [[APartyAlsoKnownAsAnOrgy parties]], or the existence of sororities and fraternities that commonly only allow one gender to join, but it's assumed that when a young adult goes to college, they likely experimented sexually with the same gender. While it's usually played for titillation purposes when done with [[GirlOnGirlIsHot women]], this trope can also apply to guys as well. It's often a PetPeeveTrope for anyone queer, as if the character is straight it can imply that homosexuality/bisexuality is just a phase (though granted, heterosexual individuals experiencing a bi-curious "phase" that goes away eventually isn't unheard of).

* ''Fanfic/AdviceAndTrust'': Misato reminds Ritsuko that the two of them had slept together at least once back when they were in college while trying to convince her to ask out Maya. The exchange shows that the incident was a case of AlcoholInducedBisexuality; however, of the two Ritsuko is ultimately revealed to be genuinely bisexual, if not having a case of IfItsYouItsOkay for Maya.

* In the novel ''The Last Theorem'', the protagonist briefly experiments with his roommate, but it doesn't get very far before a friend of the family finds out and tells his father. (His father is quite explicit that he doesn't mind experimentation, but he objects strenuously to the person his son was experimenting ''with''.)
* Charles Ryder from ''Literature/BridesheadRevisited'' is possibly this, though since we only ever see him with one male lover it might also be a case of IfItsYouItsOkay.
* In ''Literature/{{Inda}}'' the all-male class of teenagers in the military school enthusiastically experiment with one another until they are given leave to visit the pleasure houses in the city, from which point on all but two seem to be pretty much exclusively interested in women. Of the two for whom this is not true, one is gay and the other is bisexual.

* ''Literature/GirlsDontHit'': Joss convinced her roommate Crystal that them kissing or later sleeping together was just harmless college experimentation. It wasn't for Joss however-she genuinely loved Crystal, and avenged her murder.

* ''Fanfic/AdviceAndTrust'': Misato reminds Ritsuko that the two of them had slept together several times back when they were in college while trying to convince her to ask out Maya.

Maybe it's because young people are living independent of their parents, maybe it's the abundance of booze and [[APartyAlsoKnownAsAnOrgy parties]], or the existence of sororities and fraternities that commonly only allow one gender to join, but it's assumed that when a young adult goes to college, they likely experimented sexually with the same gender. While it's usually played for titillation purposes when done with [[GirlOnGirlIsHot women]], this trope can also apply to guys as well. It's often a PetPeeveTrope for anyone queer, as if the character is straight it can imply that homosexuality/bisexuality is just a phase (though granted some individuals, oftentimes heterosexuals, experiencing a bi-curious "phase" that goes away eventually isn't unheard of).

** In one episode, Rachel claims that she kissed one of her sorority sisters, only no one believes her. In the end, it turns out to be true (and the woman in question is still in love with her).

Maybe it's because young people are living independent of their parents, maybe it's the abundance of booze and [[APartyAlsoKnownAsAnOrgy parties]], or the existence of sororities and fraternities that commonly only allow one gender to join, but it's assumed that when a young adult goes to college, they likely experimented sexually with the same gender. While it's usually played for titillation purposes when done with [[GirlOnGirlIsHot women]], this trope can also apply to guys as well. It's often a PetPeeveTrope for anyone queer, as if the character is straight it can imply that homosexuality/bisexuality is just a phase (though granted that people, oftentimes heterosexuals, experiencing a bi-curious "phase" that goes away eventually isn't unheard of).

Maybe it's because young people are living independent of their parents, maybe it's the abundance of booze and [[APartyAlsoKnownAsAnOrgy parties]], or the existence of sororities and fraternities that commonly only allow one gender to join, but it's assumed that when a young adult goes to college, they likely experimented sexually with the same gender. While it's usually played for titillation purposes when done with [[GirlOnGirlIsHot women]], this trope can also apply to guys as well. It's often a PetPeeveTrope for anyone queer, as if the character is straight it can imply that homosexuality/bisexuality is just a phase.