Mate Retention Behavior
Stendhal
Individual Differences, men with very attractive partners typically
have a lot more sex, or to be more correct, frequent in-pair
copulations (IPC), as the scientists that conducted the study call it,
than the average guy. But not for the reasons you might be thinking
of.
The study, ”Female attractiveness mediates the relationship between in-
pair copulation frequency and men’s mate retention behaviors” co-
authored by Farnaz Kaighobadi and Todd K. Shackelforda from the
Evolutionary Psychology Lab at Florida Atlantic University, is one of
numerous studies that pursue several lines of research including
sexual conflict, sperm competition, infidelity and sexual jealousy,
mate retention, intimate partner violence and homicide, and mate
preferences and mate selection. The focus on this research has been on
men’s mate retention behavior.
As Kaighobadi explains:
”More attractive women are more likely to be pursued as mates by
men other than their long-term partner and, therefore, to place their
partner at greater risk of cuckoldry (investing unwittingly in a child
to whom he is genetically unrelated).
Men partnered to more attractive women perform more mate retention
behaviors – behaviors designed to thwart a woman’s infidelity. With
greater risk of female infidelity, men may perform additional anti-
cuckoldry tactics such as frequent in-pair copulations (IPC).”
The team secured self-reports from 277 hetero men in a long-term
relationship and investigated several factors such as the relationship
between female partner’s attractiveness and IPC frequency and the
mediating role of female partner’s attractiveness on the relationship
between IPC frequency and male mate retention behaviors. The results
indicated that female attractiveness predicts IPC frequency and
partially mediates the relationship between IPC frequency and male
mate retention behaviors.
Guys reported having sex with their partners about 3.3 times a week.
On a scale of 0 to 9, guys also rated their partner’s attractiveness
to an average of 7.9. The researchers noted that with each point jump
in attractiveness rating, the frequency of sex climbed by a revealing
40 percent.
So, according to the researchers, it’s all about “mate retention
behavior”, an instinctual way of acting towards your sexual partner
that traces back to Paleolithic times. All that sex is really about
marking your territory and trying to keep her from leaving you to mate
with another man.
In other words, the prettier she is, the more you’ll feel inclined to
have sex with her, the reason being that you subconsciously are trying
to keep her contented. Or at least that’s the interpretation from a
group of in-doors scientists who, for example, when it comes to name
”sex-on-a-regular-basis”, they choose to label it as ”frequent in-pair
copulations”. Isn’t that a clue that perhaps these scientists are out
of touch with reality and might be missing the obvious?
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Kind Regards,
Rafa Minuesa
http://rafaelminuesa.wordpress.com/2009/11/02/mate-retention-behavior/