Monogamy is difficult to maintain. Sure, it's easy enough at times when your life is devoid of temptation. But unless you and your partner live in isolation in a cottage in the woods, there are no guarantees that an attractive “other” will not emerge — to lure you away and challenge the sanctity of your relationship.
Probably the biggest factor in why it is hard to remain monogamous is that there are several drives built into us that contribute to reproduction, but they do not work in unison. First up is simple lust.
The median duration of first marriages that end in divorce is just under 8 years, while the median duration of second marriages that end in divorce is around 7 years.
Monogamy does exist in nature, as, of course, do females who seek out multiple partners. But nature does seem to push things in the direction of polygyny on our branch of the evolutionary tree. Among mammals, just 9 percent of species are monogamous; among primates, just 29 percent are.
The answer is simple: being monogamous is not as realistic as everyone thinks. This isn't to say that monogamy isn't possible, but rather that it isn't likely in a relationship meant to last a lifetime. With a national population near 350 million, perhaps there are just too many fish in the sea.
Monogamy is an intrinsically unstable mating strategy. Benefits include the (relative) certainty of access to the partner's reproductive potential, but the chief disadvantage is that access to other potential partners is strongly diminished, particularly in those cases where males exhibit strong mate-guarding behavior.
Interestingly, both poly and monogamous respondents in the study reported being equally as happy in their marriage.
Although polygamy is practiced in various cultures, humans still tend toward monogamy. But this was not always the norm among our ancestors. Other primates – the mammalian group, to which humans belong – are still polygamous, too.
Monogamy in humans is beneficial because it increases the chances of raising offspring, but it is actually very rare in mammals – less than 10 per cent of mammal species are monogamous, compared with 90 per cent of bird species. Even in primates, where it is more common, only about a quarter of species are monogamous.
Evolution dictates that genes have the final say. And if there is one thing genes want, it is to spread as far and wide as possible. That is why monogamy is rare among mammals. Females have to wait for a long gestation period to have a child, where as males could go and inseminate many other females in that time.
According to relationship therapist Aimee Hartstein, LCSW, as it turns out, the first year really is the hardest—even if you've already lived together. In fact, it often doesn't matter if you've been together for multiple years, the start of married life is still tricky.
60 percent of all divorces involve individuals aged 25 to 39. 25. Wives are the ones who most often file for divorce at 66 percent on average. That figure has soared to nearly 75 percent in some years.
The seven-year itch or 7-year itch refers to the notion that divorce rates reach their height around the seven-year mark of commitment. While this concept has been widely disputed, it is a concern that plagues many if they start experiencing marital issues seven years into their relationship.
There are a lot of different reasons people are drawn to non-monogamous relationships, whether it's sexual identity or a desire for something more than a traditional relationship can ever offer, but at the core, it's a desire to connect with multiple people and make up the rules as you go.
Reasons a person might choose monogamy:
You enjoy feeling special and uniquely prioritized by a romantic partner. You struggle with maintaining many relationships at the same time, whether because of limited time or limited energy. You like the simplicity of having just one relationship to nurture.
As with all things concerning the human heart, it's complicated. “The human mating system is extremely flexible,” Bernard Chapais of the University of Montreal wrote in a recent review in Evolutionary Anthropology. Only 17 percent of human cultures are strictly monogamous.
Monogamy is a relationship with only one partner at a time, rather than multiple partners. A monogamous relationship can be sexual or emotional, but it's usually both. Many modern relationships are monogamous. But even if they want to be with just one partner, some people have trouble staying monogamous.
In essence, men are only socially monogamous rather than genetically monogamous.
Jealousy has a bad reputation as a “negative” emotion. But jealous tendencies are super common within all types of relationships, including monogamous and non-monogamous ones.
Monogamy is not simply unrealistic; it is unnatural. You do not find it often in the animal kingdom, and where you do it is generally born of an evolutionary necessity. The necessity of monogamy among humankind has evaporated.
Recent discoveries have led biologists to talk about the three varieties of monogamy: social monogamy, sexual monogamy, and genetic monogamy. The distinction between these three are important to the modern understanding of monogamy.
Monogamy in Popular Culture
Being monogamous or otherwise in relationships does not necessarily directly affect mental health by itself. That said, violations of agreements to be monogamous can cause severe anxiety, jealousy, depression, and relationship problems for one or both partners.
This means that of all marriages, 58 per cent are monogamous. Only men in the top 10 per cent of status married more than two women. The most wives that anyone has is four.
Some insecure people want monogamy, but that doesn't necessarily mean someone who wants monogamy is insecure. Some people who don't want monogamy are also insecure, after all.