Eros
Is Long-Term Love More Than A Rare Phenomenon? If So, What Are Its Correlates?
Daniel O'Leary et al.
Social Psychological and Personality Science, forthcoming
Abstract:
Some individuals in long-term marriages report intensities of romantic love comparable to individuals newly in love. How common is this? Are correlates of long-term romantic love consistent with theoretical models of love? In a random sample of 274 U.S. married individuals, 40% of those married over 10 years reported being "Very intensely in love." Importantly, correlates of long-term intense love, as predicted by theory, were thinking positively about the partner and thinking about the partner when apart, affectionate behaviors and sexual intercourse, shared novel and challenging activities, and general life happiness. Wanting to know where the partner is at all times correlated significantly with intense love for men but not women. For women, but not men, passion about nonrelationship factors significantly correlated with intense love. In a random New York (NY) sample of 322 individuals married over 10 years, 29% reported being very intensely in love and our predicted correlates cross validated.
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Network Position and Sexual Dysfunction: Implications of Partner Betweenness for Men
Benjamin Cornwell & Edward Laumann
American Journal of Sociology, July 2011, Pages 172-208
Abstract:
This article combines relational perspectives on gender identity with social network structural perspectives on health to understand men's sexual functioning. The authors argue that network positions that afford independence and control over social resources are consistent with traditional masculine roles and may therefore affect men's sexual performance. For example, when a heterosexual man's female partner has more frequent contact with his confidants than he does-which the authors refer to as partner betweenness-his relational autonomy, privacy, and control are constrained. Analyses of data from the National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project (NSHAP) show that about a quarter of men experience partner betweenness and that these men are 92% more likely to report erectile dysfunction. Partner betweenness is strongest among the youngest men in the sample, which may reflect changing conceptions of masculinity in later life. The authors consider several explanations for these findings and urge additional research on the links between health, gender, and network structure.
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Marital Quality and Income: An Examination of the Influence of Government Assistance
David Schramm & William Harris
Journal of Family and Economic Issues, September 2011, Pages 437-448
Abstract:
Using data from a random telephone statewide survey in Utah, the associations between income, government assistance and six dimensions of marital quality were explored with a sample of 295 married individuals with incomes below 40000. Results indicate that income has a main effect on negative interaction and feeling trapped. An interaction of government assistance and income on two dimensions of marital quality was found. Individuals that experienced the combination of earning less than 20,000 per year while receiving government assistance had significantly lower levels of overall marital satisfaction and commitment than individuals receiving government assistance with higher incomes and individuals who have never received government assistance. Implications and possible explanations are discussed.
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Debra Lieberman & Thalma Lobel
Evolution and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
The natural experiments created by the Israeli Kibbutzim and Taiwanese minor marriages provide unique testing grounds for investigating the mechanisms governing sibling detection, inbreeding avoidance and kin-selected altruism. Here we present two studies conducted on the coreared peers of Israeli Kibbutzim. We examined how coresidence duration - a cue that would have indicated genetic relatedness in ancestral environments - impacts the development of kin-directed behaviors. In both studies, we found that coresidence duration predicts levels of altruism and sexual aversions directed toward peers. We also investigated the relationship between personal sexual aversions and moral attitudes relating to peer sexual behavior. The absence of norms proscribing sex between peers on the Kibbutz allows for a more tightly controlled investigation of this relationship. We found that total coresidence duration with opposite-sex peers predicts the intensity of moral wrongness associated with third-party peer sexual behavior, but not other behaviors, including sibling incest. More directly, we found that the summed sexual aversion felt toward all opposite-sex peers predicts levels of moral wrongness associated with third-party peer sex. Mediation analyses confirmed that personal sexual aversions mediate the relationship between coresidence duration and moral attitudes regarding peer sex. These results bolster Westermarck's original claims that childhood coresidence serves as a kinship cue, leading to greater sexual aversions and altruistic motivations, and that personal sexual aversions shape attitudes relating to third-party sexual behavior.
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Joshua Goldstein
PLoS ONE, August 2011, e14826
Abstract:
This paper shows new evidence of a steady long-term decline in age of male sexual maturity since at least the mid-eighteenth century. A method for measuring the timing of male maturity is developed based on the age at which male young adult mortality accelerates. The method is applied to mortality data from Sweden, Denmark, Norway, the United Kingdom, and Italy. The secular trend toward earlier male sexual maturity parallels the trend toward earlier menarche for females, suggesting that common environmental cues influence the speed of both males' and females' sexual maturation.
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Beyond Employment and Income: The Association Between Young Adults' Finances and Marital Timing
Jeffrey Dew & Joseph Price
Journal of Family and Economic Issues, September 2011, Pages 424-436
Abstract:
This study tested an extension of the theory of marital timing (Oppenheimer, Am J Sociol 94:563-591, 1988) by assessing whether visible and less visible financial assets and debt mediated the relationship between employment and the likelihood of marriage. We conducted these prospective, longitudinal analyses using a sample of 1,522 never-married young adults from the National Survey of Families and Households. For participants who were not cohabiting at Wave 1, financial issues such as car values predicted marriage but did not mediate the relationship between work hours, occupational prestige, and the likelihood of marriage. For cohabiting participants, employment factors were the strongest predictor of marriage.
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Kelli Stidham Hall, Caroline Moreau & James Trussell
Human Reproduction, September 2011, Pages 2541-2548
Background: To investigate reproductive health service use by young women in the USA between 2002 and 2008.
Methods: Using data from two waves of The National Survey of Family Growth, we investigated reproductive health service utilization among women aged 15-24 years (2002 n=2157; 2006-2008 n=2264). Descriptive and univariate statistics and multivariate regression models were employed to describe types of reproductive health services used and compare service use across years. Analyses focused on questions regarding specific recent use of reproductive health services (within the previous 12 months).
Results: Over half the pooled sample (n=4421) reported lifetime family planning clinic (58%) and recent reproductive health service (59%) use, including contraceptive (48%), gynecological exam (47%) and counseling (37%) services. Lifetime family planning service use declined by 15% from 2002 to 2008 (P<0.001) and recent reproductive health service use by 8% (P=0.01), including gynecological exam (8%, P= 0.03) and contraceptive (6%, P= 0.02) services. By 2006-2008, women were less likely to use reproductive health and contraceptive services than in 2002 [odds ratio (OR) 0.6, confidence interval (CI) 0.5, 0.8, P< 0.001 and OR 0.7, CI 0.6, 0.9, P= 0.005, respectively]. Trends were similar but smaller in magnitude among the sexually experienced women, with a 5% decline in both reproductive health (OR 0.7, CI 0.6, 1.0, P= 0.02) and contraceptive (OR 0.8, CI 0.6, 1.0, P= 0.03) service use.
Conclusions: Reproductive health service use among young women in the USA has declined over the past decade. Public health and policy strategies are needed to promote service use, ultimately to improve reproductive health outcomes.
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Susceptibility to sexual victimization and women's mating strategies
Carin Perilloux, Joshua Duntley & David Buss
Personality and Individual Differences, October 2011, Pages 783-786
Abstract:
Women show stable individual differences in mating strategies ranging from short-term to long-term. Short-term mating strategies may put women at greater risk of sexual victimization through increased exposure to risky situations or to men most inclined to pursue a strategy of sexual coercion. To test these predictions, we studied female college students who had experienced a completed rape, an attempted sexual victimization, or no sexual victimization. Women's mating strategies were assessed through the Sociosexual Orientation Inventory. Victims further reported whether they engaged in consensual intimate behaviors with their victimizer before or after the victimization. Victims of completed rape scored highest on short-term mating strategy pursuit; non-victims scored lowest; women experiencing attempted victimization scored between these two groups. Victims of completed rape also more frequently reported consensual kissing and intercourse with their victimizer before and after the victimization than women who experienced attempted victimization. The findings of this study should not be interpreted as blaming the victim, but rather as identifying circumstances that put women at greater risk. Clearly, perpetrators are to blame for sexual victimization. Discussion focuses on future research directions and on practical implications for reducing rates of sexual victimization.
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The Relationship Between Internet Access and Divorce Rate
Todd Kendall
Journal of Family and Economic Issues, September 2011, Pages 449-460
Abstract:
The rise of the internet has affected the market for romantic partners, arguably lowering search costs. It has been claimed anecdotally that this has led to an increase in divorce. However, a more careful examination of theory suggests that, even if search costs have declined with the rise of the internet, this would not necessarily increase divorce propensity. To examine the issue empirically, this paper employs both state- and household-level data on family structure from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Current Population Survey. A comparison of high and low internet penetration states, as well as a micro panel of initially married households with and without internet access, reveals no evidence that the rise of the internet has increased divorce.
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Oxytocin administration leads to a preference for masculinized male faces
Angeliki Theodoridou et al.
Psychoneuroendocrinology, September 2011, Pages 1257-1260
Abstract:
Preferences for sexually dimorphic traits in men's faces are consistent with a trade-off between cues to indirect (genetic) and direct (prosociality) benefits, associated perceptually with relative masculinity and femininity respectively. As the neuropeptide oxytocin (OT) has been shown to promote social perception, we hypothesized that temporary OT elevation would result in a preference for masculinity in men's faces, by reducing the apparent social costs of masculine traits. In a double-blind, placebo-controlled study, 96 participants received either 24 IU OT or placebo. They then completed a computer task in which they used the mouse to alter the shape of displayed men's and women's faces, making them look more or less masculine. Participants were instructed to make each face as attractive as possible. OT administration led to a trend for a relative preference for masculinity in men's faces but did not affect preferences for femininity in women's faces, and this effect occurred irrespective of the participant's sex. We tentatively speculate that OT may 'mask' negative personality attributions normally associated with masculine male faces. These results may be pointing to the role of personality attribution in attractiveness judgements, and the role of OT in social perception.
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Peter Jonason et al.
Personality and Individual Differences, October 2011, Pages 759-763
Abstract:
The current study (N = 242) seeks to establish the relationship between traits known collectively as the Dark Triad - narcissism, psychopathy, Machiavellianism - and mating standards and preferences. Using a budget-allocation task, we correlated scores on the Dark Triad traits with mate preferences for a long-term and short-term mate. Men scoring high on the Dark Triad may be more indiscriminate than most when selecting for short-term mates in order to widen their prospects. Furthermore, those high on the Dark Triad - psychopathy in particular - tend to select for mates based on self-interest, assortative mating, or a predilection for volatile environments. We assessed these correlations when controlling for the Big Five and the sex of the participant. We also tested for moderation by the sex of the participant and mating context. Ramifications and future directions are considered.
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Zachary Simmons & James Roney
Hormones and Behavior, August 2011, Pages 306-312
Abstract:
An expanding body of research suggests that circulating androgens regulate the allocation of energy between mating and survival effort in human males, with higher androgen levels promoting greater investment in mating effort. Because variations in the number of CAG codon repeats in the human androgen receptor (AR) gene appear to modulate the phenotypic effects of androgens - with shorter repeat lengths associated with greater androgenic effects per unit androgen - polymorphisms in this gene may predict trait-like individual differences in the degree to which men are calibrated toward greater mating effort. Consistent with this, men in the present study with shorter CAG repeat lengths exhibited greater upper body strength and scored higher on self-report measures of dominance and prestige, all of which are argued to be indices of mating effort. Repeat length failed to predict sociosexual orientation (i.e. pursuit of short-term mating relationships), however, suggesting that the traits correlated with this polymorphism may be primarily associated with intrasexual competitiveness in the service of long-term mating effort. None of these measures of mating effort was related to baseline testosterone concentrations (either as main effects or as interactions with CAG repeat length), implying that long-term androgen exposure associated with AR gene polymorphisms may account for more variance in some androgen-dependent traits than does current testosterone concentration. These findings provide further evidence for the importance of the CAG repeat polymorphism in the AR gene in explaining a broad range of individual differences in human males.
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The Social Costs and Benefits of Anger as a Function of Gender and Relationship Context
Agneta Fischer & Catharine Evers
Sex Roles, July 2011, Pages 23-34
Abstract:
On the basis of Social Role Theory and a social functional view of emotions, we argue that gender differences in anger experiences and expression are related to men's and women's relationship context. We hypothesized that women in traditional relationship contexts would express their anger less directly, and would suppress their anger more, due to expected negative social appraisals. We compared anger reactions to a conflict situation in a traditional and egalitarian relationship context. Eighty-two Dutch adult participants (43 women and 39 men) were recruited partly by students in a psychology class, and partly by a snowball method. They were invited to participate only if they had a steady relationship of minimally one year. The results show that women report more intense subjective anger in both contexts, but that the expression of anger differed with relationship context. In traditional relationships women tend to suppress their anger more than men, while men report to express their anger directly more than women. This difference in anger expression was mediated by negative social appraisals. In egalitarian relationships, this difference was not found.