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Why do men and women cheat on each other? How do men really feel when their partners have sex with other men? What worries women more -- men who turn to other women for love or men who simply want sexual variety in their lives? Can the jealousy husbands and wives experience over real or imagined infidelities be cured? Should it be? In this surprising and engaging exploration of men's and women's darker passions, David Buss, acclaimed author of The Evolution of Desire, reveals that both men and women are actually designed for jealousy. Drawing on experiments, surveys, and interviews conducted in thirty-seven countries on six continents, as well as insights from recent discoveries in biology, anthropology, and psychology, Buss discovers that the evolutionary origins of our sexual desires still shape our passions today. According to Buss, more men than women want to have sex with multiple partners. Furthermore, women who cheat on their husbands do so when they are most likely to conceive, but have sex with their spouses when they are least likely to conceive. These findings show that evolutionary tendencies to acquire better genes through different partners still lurk beneath modern sexual behavior. To counteract these desires to stray -- and to strengthen the bonds between partners -- jealousy evolved as an early detection system of infidelity in the ancient and mysterious ritual of mating. Buss takes us on a fascinating journey through many cultures, from pre-historic to the present, to show the profound evolutionary effect jealousy has had on all of us. Only with a healthy balance of jealousy and trust can we be certain of a mate's commitment, devotion, and true love.
E-Book Content
The Dangerous Passion Why Jealousy Is as Necessary as Love and Sex
DAVID M. BUSS, Ph.D.
THE FREE PRESS New York London Sydney Singapore
OTHERBOOKS BYDAVIDM. BUSS
The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating
Sex, Power, Conflict: Evolutionary and Feminist Perspectives(ed., with Neil Malamuth)
Evolutionary Psychology: The New Science of the Mind THE FREE PRESS A Division of Simon & Schuster Inc. 1230 Avenue of the Americas New York, NY 10020
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Copyright © 2000 by David M. Buss
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ISBN 0-684-86786-9
For Cindy
Acknowledgements THOSE WHO DEVOTE THEIR LIVESto penetrating the mysteries of human nature face an unusual circumstance, one in which the targets of study happen to include their own minds. Sometimes it’s a personal insight that leads to a scientific discovery, but in my case, it was a scientific finding that led to a personal revelation. In one of my first formal studies of jealousy, we asked women and men to imagine their partner having sex with someone else. Some people displayed intense sexual jealousy, shaking with rage when these disturbing images filled their heads. Others seemed less upset, at least on the surface. I wanted to find out why. One critical factor turned out to be whether or not a person had already experienced a committed sexual relationship. Those who were either in love or who had loved and lost, displayed far more florid sexual jealousy than those who merely longed for love but had never experienced it. As these results rolled off the computer printer, memories flooded my head of previously buried events of my past. As a youth of 17, influenced no doubt by the prevailing cultural ideologies of the time, I publicly proclaimed that my girlfriend’s body was her own, that she could have sex with anyone she wanted, and that jealousy was an immature emotion of up-tight, hung-up, unliberated individuals. I