Infidelity is genetic

Nov 29, 2004

For nearly half of the women who cheat on their sexual partners, it is their genes and not jeans to blame.

For nearly half of the women who cheat on their sexual partners, it is their genes and not jeans to blame.

One of the largest ever sexual surveys, conducted in Britain, has revealed that 40% of female infidelity can be explained by heredity.

The survey involving 1,600 pairs of twins, was published in the journal Twin Research.

The scientists matched responses from matching pairs of identical and non-identical twins.

“Twins are the perfect natural experiment, because they do what you cannot do in families, that is, separate out nature and nurture.

We are taking a group of identical twins who are clones of each other, and who have exactly the same environment and comparing them to non-identical twins who, like brother and sister, share 50% of their genes and also have the same environment.”

The women interviewed in this survey were aged between 18 and 80 and on average they had had between four and five sexual partners. One in four had been divorced.

The study revealed that 22% of women reported being unfaithful to a regular partner. More than 90% admitted to having thought about infidelity at some point.

Paradoxically, the greatest number — around 40% of the sample also thought that infidelity was always wrong.

“Obviously, there weren’t people who thought it was always right. So the vast majority thought it was always wrong. Another group said it was mostly wrong. I think about 2% said it was hardly ever wrong,” said Prof Spector.

The London team found that a number of genes might be involved.

“We are not talking about a single gene here. There is not an infidelity gene, or a fidelity gene. We are inheriting perhaps 50 or 100 genes that are important in giving us a tendency to respond to our environments in different ways,” said Prof. Spector.

Guardian

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