Why Men Don't Care If You Cheat With This Particular Person
Men are so predictable.
PKpix / Shutterstock Another day, another update in the world of the science behind infidelity. Are you ready to hear something really depressing this time about cheating, other than the fact that it's incredibly devastating and can cause weeks, possibly months, of pain?
A 2011 study from the University of Texas at Austin, published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, found that men are more than twice as likely to stay with their girlfriends after they've cheated with another woman than if they had cheated with another man.
The study surveyed 700 college students, asking them to imagine that they were in a committed relationship with someone they'd been dating for three months.
They were then asked to respond to different scenarios, in which their partner had been unfaithful. These included a scenario with either a man, a woman, multiple men, or multiple women.
The research found that men were 50 percent more likely to stay with a woman after she had cheated with another woman, but only 22 percent were more likely to stay with a partner who had strayed with the opposite sex.
As for women, 28 percent said they would continue to date a boyfriend who had an affair with another woman, while only 21 percent would stay with a man who had a same-sex affair.
The study's findings suggested that men are only really threatened by indiscretions that come in the way of their paternity or having offspring.
According to Jaime C. Confer, the study's lead author, "A robust jealousy mechanism is activated in men and women by different types of cues, those that threaten paternity in men and those that threaten abandonment in women."
The study provided a better look into why men have such a strong desire to have a variety of different partners, while a woman tends to have the desire to have a partner who is committed to her. These specific desires of men and women have been known to play a significant role in the evolution of human mating psychology.
As per the research findings, men also view a partner's homosexual affair as an "opportunity to mate with more than one woman simultaneously, satisfying men's greater desire for more partners," according to the authors.
May we also add to their very obvious desire to watch two women together and, in turn, their desire for threesomes? Oh, men, you're so predictable and we certainly didn't need science to tell us that.
Stephanie Castillo is a writer whose work has been featured in Prevention, Women's Health, and more.
Editor's Note: This article was originally posted in August 2011.