Why Men Cheat More Than Women

A recently published study strongly suggests men succumb to s*xual temptations more than women for example, cheating on a partner — because they experience strong s*xual impulses, not because they have weak self-control

Previous research has shown that men are more likely than women to pursue romantic partners that are “off limits.” However, until now, the explanation for this s*x difference was largely unexplored.

One possible explanation for this effect is that men experience stronger s*xual impulses than women do. A second possibility is that women have better self-control than men. The current study’s results support the former explanation and provide new insight into humans’ evolutionary origins.

“Overall, these studies suggest that men are more likely to give in to s*xual temptations because they tend to have stronger s*xual impulse strength than women do,” says Natasha
Tidwell, a doctoral student in the Department of Psychology at Texas A&M University, who authored the study. Paul Eastwick, assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences at The University of Texas at Austin, co-authored the study.

“But when people exercise self-control in a given situation, this s*x difference in behavior is greatly reduced. It makes sense that self-control, which has relatively recent evolutionary origins compared to s*xual impulses, would work similarly — and as effectively – for both men and women,” Tidwell said.

Recently published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, the study was composed of two separate experiments: the first, to determine how the s*xes reacted to real-life s*xual temptations in their past and, the second, to pick apart s*xual impulses and self-control using a rapid-fire reaction time task.

In order to test their first hypothesis, researchers recruited 218 (70 male, 148 female) study participants from the United States.

Participants were first asked to recall and describe an attraction to an unavailable or incompatible member of the opposite s*x. They then answered survey questions designed to measure strength of sexual impulse, attempts to intentionally control the s*xual impulse, and resultant behaviors.

“When men reflected on their past s*xual behavior, they reported experiencing relatively stronger impulses and acting on those impulses more than women did,” says Tidwell.

However, men and women did not differ in the extent to which they exerted self-control.

“When men and women said they actually did exert self-control in s*xual situations, impulse strength didn’t predict how much either s*x would actually engage in ‘off-limits’ s*x,” added Tidwell.

 Source: Science Daily