Rolling Stone Drive
Are men more likely than women to cause sex scandals? Are men more willing than women to risk losing their careers and families in order to pursue new mating opportunities?
Yielding to Darwin’s theory of natural selection many will see the sex difference has evolutionary biological roots.
The author of a New York Times article says,
"It would be easy to... dismiss" the sex difference "as a testosterone induced, hard-wired connection between sex and power."
Sheryl Stolberg says women in power are more serious about their jobs, though, there is little support for her claim.
Amanda Marcotte says men cause more scandals because there are more men in power. The implication because women would be more harshly punished for such behavior, loss of career. Yet, this leaves open the explanation why men haven't done much to stop them.
Stolberg says that to accept the fact the sex difference is biological would be to dismiss the behavior.
Evolutionary success is mainly about success in reproductive competition.
Because the obligatory costs of reproduction are lower for males than females, the sexes employ significant differences in mating strategies.
Females evolve to be relatively choosy about who they mate with. So, they’re lower in sociosexuality, promiscuous, uncommitted sex.
Males, on the other hand, have more to gain and less to lose from having large numbers of sexual partners, and they evolve to be less choosy, higher in sociosexuality.
A case in point, say men and women each had one hundred sex partners in one year. The woman could produce exactly one child, whether she had one or 100 partners, and so would gain little from those 99 extra partners. For the man, on the other hand, 99 extra partners could, in theory, mean 99 extra offspring.
This sex difference in the desire for new mates doesn't mean that men aren't interested in long-term, committed relationships. Contrarily, most men strive for such relationships and value them deeply. But it does mean the average man will regard opportunities to mate with new partners as more compelling than the average woman would. The strength of this temptation will generally be proportional to his social status. The higher his status, the more women will be attracted to him, the more opportunities he will face.
So the high status man will often make a choice. His long-term interest modules are coaching him to benefit his family, career and reputation. His mating modules are urging him to pursue new sexual opportunities.
It doesn’t make sense to say that because this applies to humans, we must see scandalous male behavior as natural, condonable or inevitable. Cross-culturally men are much more likely than women to commit murder, but thankfully, people in most modern societies don't think that it's natural, condonable or inevitable for men to do such a thing.
If you're a man who wants to avoid wrecking your life for the chance of a new mating opportunity, your best hope is to recognize that when these opportunities present themselves, your brain's mating modules will know exactly what they want you to do. You may feel like they're making a heroic effort to get you to do it. They may even cause you to badly underestimate the damage brought upon your family and career. Similarly, overestimate your chances of getting away with it or of being forgiven.
To avoid doing something you may regret, recognize your mating modules for what they are. Be aware of what they're trying to persuade you to do. This wisdom will increase your power to ignore them, and to listen more to the parts of your brain that evolved to serve you in the real long term.
Psychology Today
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