A recent survey showed that 23 percent of men and 12 percent of women have reported cheating at some point in their marriage, but what was the reason for them to cheat?
In a recent nationwide broadcast, Newt Gingrich stated that “There’s no doubt that at times in my life, partly driven by how passionately I felt about this country, that I worked too hard and things happened.”
You can probably imagine that when he said he “worked too hard” and “things happened,” he was trying to blame working so hard and serving the American people as a reason why he cheated on his wife.
While this may seem comical and a strange way to rationalize cheating, what Newt Gingrich said might actually be in line with what scientists and psychologists say about reasons on why men and women cheat.
Types of Men and Women That Cheat
According to scientists, people who are dominant, or within the extremes of being very warm or very cold are more likely to cheat.
Patrick Markey, a psychologist at Villanova University, and his wife Charlotte, a psychologist at Rutgers University, headed a recent study. 210 adults took a test that measured their interpersonal characteristics and they also disclosed what kind of sexual activities they partook in.
They found that a dominant person is common characteristic for a person that has multiple sexual partners. This is in line with many politicians, who are often in positions of power.
They also found that men and women who are very warm tend to sleep around more in order to show their love, and it is not really done for sexual pleasure. On the other hand, men and women who are neither too warm nor too cold are less likely to cheat.
While it doesn’t seem plausible that a politician would cheat in order to show warmth instead of getting sexual gratification, politicians don’t seem to have moderate personalities either.
What Prevents Cheating?
Researchers that try to figure out the reasons why men and women cheat generally divide their data into two areas. They say that people of certain income levels and certain religious backgrounds are less likely to cheat.
A 1998 General Social Survey that was done by the National Opinion Research Center showed that people earning between $40,000 – $60,000 a year were less likely to report an affair.
While a lot of inflation has occurred since 1998, the salary range of $40,000 – $60,000 is more or less middle class. One might be able to draw a conclusion that people who make too much money or too little are more likely to cheat. It also showed that religious men and women are less likely to cheat.
Gingrich is definitely upper class, putting him in a likely high-risk zone for cheating. As for being religious, it’s hard to say other than he has strong ties to a lot of religious leaders. The study done in 1998 also showed that while religious people are less likely to cheat, prayer showed more or less no effect in keeping men and women from cheating.
Reasons Why Men and Women Cheat: Freedom and the Internet?
A recent showed that there is an increase in women that cheat, and one of the reasons could be the additional freedom that they have and access to the Internet.
An owner of a dating website recently did a poll and he shared some of his results. He found that many more women were going to the Internet for affairs.
His reasoning on why this happened is because more women have more freedoms than they did in the 1960s. Their husbands no longer closely controlled everything. Now that they have more freedom, they take more control of their sexual needs without being monitored.
While women cheating have increased, more freedom may not necessarily be a reason for women to cheat. It just might be that they’re freely admitting it in the poll without fear of consequences.
Most startling about the poll, showed that women cheated not because of trying to get away from problems, but because they were “treating” themselves. Also, the poll showed that a reason why women cheat is because of boredom. 38 percent cites this as the reason for them to go online and find a casual acquaintance.
Sources:
Reasons Men and Women Cheat: Newt Gingrich’s Answer
Reasons Men and Women Cheat: Prayer Doesn’t Deter Cheating
Reasons Men and Women Cheat: Who is More Likely
Reasons Men and Women Cheat: Women Cheating Online Rising
