diego@cca.UUCP (Diego Gonzalez) (01/03/86)
I originally wrote to the net concerning extra-marital activities of males vs. women's considerations in marriage in the hopes of rekindling discussion in the net. At that time, I had not re-read Hite's books. Since the topic has proven interesting to at least some NET.SOCIAL readers, I will recheck and print the actual excerpts from the two reports. When it first struck me that there might be a consistent difference between the expectations of partners in marriage and the reality (developed out of numerous conversations with male and female friends), I checked the best source of statistics that I knew of - the two Hite reports. I was disappointed to discover that her approach had changed, at least in the presentation of information revealed by her surveys. As a result, there are not directly corresponding statements regarding male and female extra-marital activities and attitudes. My impression was (note that I am not offering this as fact), however, that since women probably do not regard their fathers as "philanderers" but rather as [almost] idealistically upright and faithful (in the common sense). (The term "father" can be taken to mean _f_a_t_h_e_r _f_i_g_u_r_e, which would include any male whose character and attitude toward mother or other female might be admired.) I think that the fairly broad attitude of women in the U. S. is something like: "My father was faithful to my mother (only) and I expect my husband/SO to be likewise to me." In light of the 70% figure in Hite's report, I wonder if the basic anticipation is not at least a little naive. Anyhow, I will check the actual entries and post them to the net. Perhaps that will remove some of the apples-oranges sense that the issue currently has.
diego@cca.UUCP (Diego Gonzalez) (01/10/86)
> > . . . > Anyhow, I will check the actual entries and post them to the > net. Perhaps that will remove some of the apples-oranges sense > that the issue currently has. > I promised you some better statistical information if I could find it on the frequency of extra-marital relationships among men. According to the breakdown on page 1096 of "The Hite Report on Male Sexuality" (Knopf, 1981), here are the figures. Years No extra- Did have married marital sex extra-marital sex 0-1 84% 16% 2-5 24% 76% 6-10 38% 62% 11-15 29% 71% 16-20 29% 71% 21-25 20% 80% 26-30 29% 71% 31-35 26% 74% 36+ 30% _7_0% Average: 66% Married two years or more, average: 72% The disappointing news is that although the report on women's sexuality (at least on one questionaire) had asked about women's extra-marital sexual activities, the report findings are presented in a different style and there was no summary of responses. It is not possible to say, then, what percentage of women had had extra-marital sex based on data available to me. If some NET.SOCIAL readers have seen some reliable figures, I'm sure it would serve the interest of this discussion. It would also be interesting to know what women's perspectives are towards the facts of men's extra-marital sexual relations. (By the way, the figures as presented give a years-of-marriage orientation to the statistics. If you mapped out the implicit age groups (roughly, based on the 1981 publication date), you would also see an interesting variation based on social morays of the respon- dents developmental eras.) I noted that in several responses, netters referred to "cheating" when discussing extra-marital sexuality. While I ac- knowledge that in many minds the terms are equivalent and inter- changeable, there is a judgemental connotation to the term "cheating" which clouds people's response to the concept. I would contend that if an overwhelming majority of males engage in an activity that is publicly disapproved (at least superficially) that the issue is far from trivial. It seems to represent a behavioral compulsion that crosses economic, social, and reli- gious boundaries and yet is not generally accepted as commonplace in our society. I brought the issue up in the first place because I feel that there is a tendency, in human society, to "look away" from certain known facets of life. (For example, look at California and its Evolution/Creation textbook controversy.) Evidence that is ignored in deference to more comfortable "beliefs" cannot change what that evidence implies. It seems only to delay our using knowledge to our advantage. If the majority of divorce, say (and I am not at all sure that this is the case), were due to "infidelity" of the male partner, perhaps fidelity in the sense of sexual monogamy is not a useful interpretation or expectation. In a comment I posted last week, I tried to point out that my reason for including the information regarding women's seeking mates like their fathers was to point out an apparent incon- sistency. If one assumes that a large proportion of women expect sexual monogamy on the part of their partners and that this characteristic is consistent with their views of their fathers (or father figures), then the 70% must be ignored or unknown to most women.