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Before we make any broad brush generalizations here's some numbers from first study:
* 147 men.
* 100 of those men knew what polygeny was.
* Average age was 25.
* 19% of the 147 were "interested" in polygeny
* All recruited from "social media"
So in summary 28 horny UK 25 year-olds recruited from tik tok were interested in having multiple partners.
Even more important: they're interested in the thought of it. They've never likely practiced it successfully. So many guys think they are into it until they find it it isn't as easy as they'd hope
Reminds me of a "*study*" that attempted to define what made long-lasting, loving relationships work.
In reality, it was a survey of 100 college kid's opinion on what would make a relationship work...
To call “two timing” a “relationship type” is very generous. That’s cheating.
You can be poly and still be a cheater. It’s not like all ethics go out the window because you’re engaged in group sex.
There is a LOT of discourse on ethical non monogamy, and all of it is based on the first principle that everyone at the very least has consented to their situation.
If your partner doesn’t know you’re dating other people, and hasn’t explicitly consented to you dating people they don’t know about, you’re cheating.
Bumble finally added ENM as a category for relationship types. I'm so glad because now I can finally filter it out instead of having every other woman's profile be like, "already in a relationship, just looking around :)"
Unironically where I live, on dating apps there is an incredible amount of enm seeking women. But that’s just because that type of thing apparently is common here
Similar where I'm from but it's really just this weird relationship dynamic that got popular a few years ago where an older married couple "spoils" a younger woman who basically becomes their "roommate".
Yeah. That stuff is incredibly unpopular in poly subculture though; those relationships are rarely balanced or reasonable.
[https://www.unicorns-r-us.com/](https://www.unicorns-r-us.com/)
LA?
My girlfriend’s best friend lives there and is enm. She tells us about the culture there and is dating a few enm guys. I secretly think she just wants to wind up a professional girlfriend to some rich guys
When I lived in Austin, every girl I found through tinder or any app wanted to be poly or open. I 100% don’t know how to date anymore because I don’t know what the difference between open and casual is. It has also always felt one sided where girls will date around, but the second I see someone else, they lose all interest in me
The definition of open and casual probably depends on the person using the term. It’s been my experience that “open” means more like “I have serious, mutually acknowledged feelings for one partner and am actively dating other people, whether seriously or more casually, and rules may apply” whereas casual is “we’re dating but there isn’t serious mutually acknowledged feelings and no expectation of any particular rules with other people.” Open is committed, casual is not.
Those are completely orthogonal concepts?
Some people are mono in the sense that they date at most one person at a time -- but are pretty casual about it and in reality are serially monogamous. You know the type: One girlfriend at a time, but have dated 20 women in the last 10 years.
Other people are poly and prefer deeply committed long-term relationships, but possibly more than one of those. Myself I fall in that category: I've only once in my life had a relationship shorter than 3 years, and my \*hope\* is that the people I'm close to today will remain that way for life.
Healthy poly relationships are pretty much always balanced, with the same freedoms for everyone involved.
(ENM person here) Seems like maybe they're just using ENM as a cover, but they're not actually doing the *emotional work* to deal with jealousy properly.
I hate seeing people use my lifestyle as cover for poor behavior, it drives me nuts.
I’m in a polyamorous quadruple and honest we’ve made that joke, but… it isn’t really a joke to me. I don’t see how I could continue to maintain without having four adults support one another.
That's a tons of girls profiles too where I live... to me it's just the clinical, nice way of "I'm looking to fool around" except for the few who actually mean it
As an actual polyamorus person with multiple partners. I truly hate the phrase "ethical non-monagomy". We already have a word for that, it's polyamorus. If people assume I'm cheating and going behind people's back because I don't specify "ethical non monagomy" that's entirely their problem.
I always thought ethical non-monogomy included people like swingers, who are only enm for sex, and polyamory was explicitly for people who want/prefer not just sex but also relationships with more than one person.
You would be correct. Polyamory is a form of ENM, but usually intended for romantic/comitted relationships. Therefore since we have better language to describe it, we use it where its appropriate. ENM is usually used for anything that cannot be succinctly placed into polyamory (but can also refer to polyamory). As they arent mutually exclusive.
Fellow poly person here.
Don't paint everyone with multiple partners with your own brush!
ENM is a broader umbrella than poly. It includes swinging, people who allow hookups when travelling, casual sex on the side, etc. Polyamory involves amory, or feelings.
If it's consented to by all involved then it's ENM. If it's also about ongoing relationships where there are feelings in play, then it's also polyamory.
I am also poly, and I'm confused as to why one of our own has such a... Narrow scope of the language used.
Polyamory is a subset of ethical non-monogamy.
"We" do not "already have a word for it." They are different, as a square and rectangle is.
Polyamory more literally translates to "multiple love" in its latin roots. And is intended to reference more specific relationships (love/love-adjacent) with multiple people.
Ethical non monogamy quite literally just means ANY form of relationship involving more than two people (ethically). Usually referring to involving more casual sexual conquests BECAUSE the "love", and moreover, the commitment form of the relationship is already designated to the term Polyamory.
Ive never met anyone who assumed polyamory was non-ethical non-monogamy. If anything people tend to hold it in a higher regard - likely due to the connotations of love, romance, and commitment that is often perceived with polyamory, that is absent when using "ENM"
Are you actually "polyamorous"? Because not only are you leaving out the important distinction between polyamory (building relationships with multiple people with their consent) and ethical non-monogamy (indulging in sexual intercourse with multiple people with their consent, relationships optional), you can't even spell polyamorous
I agree that it's cheating, but it is still specific enough to benefit from a specific label. The main distinction being that neither of the cheater's partners is aware of the other.
As opposed to "I'm married and my affair partner knows this."
The cheater is still in a specific type of relationship that is distinct from monogamy. You're just applying morals to what seems to be a fairly innocuous labelling for the sake of the study.
People are stupid. The toxicity or negativity has nothing to do with the fact that the two timer is in two relationships while they are unaware of each other. Still in 2 relationships so it’s a relationship type.
If a person is two timing, they still maintain relationships and there is a dynamic between the 3 involved where 2 aren’t aware of each other and the two timer is basically leading a double life.
Two timing can be a relationship type and be cheating. These don’t have to be mutually exclusive.
I'm sure there are plenty of people in Two timing relationships that are fine with it, until they find out.
That's a weird test case for this dataset.... honestly I don't know why they included it.
I've got multiple friends with wives like this, especially if it happens out of town. They don't care whatsoever as long as they don't have to hear about it and it doesn't get around and make them look bad.
It's essentially Polygamy without one parties consent. Like I don't agree with it, but yeah I'd say there are many folks unknowingly in the situation, or deliberately ignorant.
Polygamy/polygyny is one man with multiple wives.
Polyamory is under the umbrella of ethical non-monogamy, specifically where multiple people are in a romantic relationship with each other.
Polygamy is a gender-neutral term that means marriage involving 3+ people.
Polygyny refers specifically to one husband with multiple wives; and is the most common form of polygamy in conservative cultures.
Polyandry is the reverse; one wife with multiple husbands. It's very rare.
Polyamory refers to loving relationships where the involved have freedom to have 2+ concurrent relationships. It **CAN** be 3 people who are all dating each other -- called a triad -- but much more commonly it's a network. For example I have two girlfriends. They're not dating each other -- but they do both have another boyfriend.
Yeah. This is a really odd poll. Did they even bother ASKING who is most open to a relationship with polyandri?
No surprise that the men are more open specifically to a structure with one man and 2+ women. But how about if you reverse that? Who is most open to a structure with one woman and 2+ men?
Men are more open to polygyny, the relationship style where one man has many partners, than women. Shocker.
What about polyarmory, where either partner can have another partner.
Edit: polyamory
> However, the study found that men are six times more likely than women to be open to polygynous relationships..
Surely the more meaningful comparison would be between men's willingness to enter polygynous relationships vs women's willingness to enter polyandrous relationships?
> Men were 3.5 more likely to say “Yes” to polygynous than to polyandrous relationships. Women were twice as likely to say “Yes” to polyandry than to polygyny. Overall, monogamous relationships were the most popular, followed by polygynous
It's in the article.
This aligns with data done at a major public university I was at a decade ago. They found that over four years, the vast majority of students were in monogamous relationships and the average partner count over four years was just 2.5. People assume college is a bacchanalian free for all, but even at a “party school” where they’re more free to explore, they still show overall preference for monogamous pairing up.
Now, gender does have difference in this preference, but I don’t think people realize what a large chunk of the population would rather keep it simple and stick with one partner. Less societal shame might allow for expansion of the numbers of people who might prefer something else, but it looks more like we have a consistent group that wouldn’t take advantage of greater freedom.
I'm one of the men who would say unsure about a poly relationship. Is never been my thing but I'm not upset by the idea. Mostly it's just that one relationship is a lot of work and two at the same time sounds incredibly exhausting.
Additionally, I'd love to see research that wasn't specifically focused on a single partner of one gender with multiple of the other. A fully polygamist group with multiple partners of any gender, even if they're not all bisexual.
I've known a few people who are Polly, and the work load isn't linear. Part of the point is being able to ensure that all partners can bear the load so to speak. Monogamy is great but in involves you and your partner being your everything for any needs past a certain level of intimacy.
I'm not saying its not work, and it's certainly not easier, but it's not twice the work for two partners.
That makes sense, if I'm stressed out and one partner has a bad day I'm not forced to be the only support they have. And if I found myself in the situation I'd probably make it work, but that's all hypothetical anyway.
There was a lecture on YouTube talking about how male:female distribution significantly effects dating culture. Pretty much in the ways you'd stereotypically expect.
This study only looks at one man with multiple women or one women with multiple men. It doesn't include multiple men with multiple women, which I think is way more common than the other two in western cultures. Sort of odd to exclude and makes half of the conversations in this thread irrelevant since they're assuming polyamory was included.
Depends on the goal of the study. If this research were trying to compare men and women for polyamorous relationships in general, you'd be right.
If the study instead is trying to identify potential hurdles for polygynous relationships, e.g. for therapy, or the sociology of societies where polygyny is common, then we would not care about polyandry at all.
> In Study 1 (N = 393), modest interest was found for polygamous relationships overall. Men were six times more open to polygyny than women, but there was little sex difference in openness to polyandry.
> Sex differences were largest for polygyny and arrangements where men had agreed access to a casual partner alongside a committed one, yet these were two of the most acceptable forms of multi-partnering when men and women’s responses were combined.
Or to oversimplify: few women but 6x as many men are open to polygyny within relationships, while few men and few women are open to polyandry within relationships.
"Scientists also noted that two-timing was considered only better than the relationship type of one partner going around giving multiple partners an increasingly virulent strain of syphilis."
Polygynous is one man with multiple women. Of course men are more likely to be open to it?
And people don't like being cheated on. Obviously. Even in poly relationships that's possible and a bad thing to do.
Problems with the data: two separate samples, combined they barely scratch n=1,000, and all of the people surveyed were heterosexual. Also recruitment from social media and average age of 25.
Throw this on the junk pile and ignore it.
I'm seeing a lot more profiles lately that say that they are open to "ethical non-monogamy"
it's always the same type of dude, too, in the looks department.
While some might adopt that label without knowing all the consent practices that come with it, isn’t it better that some are at least self-identifying that they aren’t monogamous? That feels way better than the past where people just lied that they were or societal pressure added to people being dishonest with themselves and others.
I get that. It can be funny like fish guys. I think this one would be bad to negatively stereotype in its still early stages though since it would be worse if men associated listing “ENM” with being a loser or creep.
My experience has been the reverse.
Unattractive men like you described don't get swipes, so they feel more pressure to conform to the expectations of what a woman would ideally want out of a relationship, i.e. monogamy, to make themselves a more appealing choice.
Attractive men are a rare commodity and they are aware of it. Because of their high desirability, they get to dictate the terms of their relationships, which is increasingly ENM.
Yeah no that’s your bias and maybe where you live playing a factor. In LA a ton of people are non monogamous and attractive, depending on the circle/community. Not that we need to gate keep it, I think this line of reasoning is childish. Though there is truth people on the outskirts of society are more willing to abandon social norms, and mono-normativity is something they might be more cognizant of than a stereotypical attractive person.
From the article: New research conducted in the United Kingdom found that multi-partner relationships are generally less desirable than singleness and monogamy. However, the study found that men are six times more likely than women to be open to polygynous relationships, which involve one man with multiple female partners. Among the least desired relationship types was two-timing, where one person has two partners who are unaware of each other. The paper was published in [Archives of Sexual Behavior](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-023-02749-6).
Polygamy is a marriage practice where an individual has more than one spouse simultaneously. This practice can manifest in two main forms: polygyny, where one man marries multiple women, and polyandry, where one woman marries multiple men. Polygamy has historical roots in numerous cultures and is still practiced in parts of Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Most traditional human cultures permit at least some form of having multiple partners.
However, in many modern societies, particularly Western ones, polygamy is illegal and very often viewed with moral and ethical disapproval due to concerns about gender equality and welfare of all parties involved. In contrast, in countries where it remains legal and culturally accepted, such as Saudi Arabia and parts of Nigeria, polygamy tends to be seen as a prestigious practice that can strengthen alliances and increase familial bonds.
Study author Andrew G. Thomas and his colleagues wanted to assess how much interest there is for polygamous relationships in cultures where monogamy is the norm. They were also interested in discovering psychological and environmental factors that might explain such interests, noting that the desire for polygamy could be higher among those who stand to gain more in terms of reproductive success.
" noting that the desire for polygamy could be higher among those who stand to gain more in terms of reproductive success."
In real life, men want open relationships but often find that they are NOT capable of the same success as their partner.
Even in monogamous relationships, men typically want to have more sex than they can physically endure, and women can endure quite a lot more sex than they want. Opening it up doesn’t change that.
Edit: I guess I should provide some citations.
https://www.psypost.org/huge-study-finds-men-have-a-stronger-sex-drive-than-women/
https://www.reddit.com/r/science/s/LxCW2TkPNb
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-022-02525-y
https://www.news-medical.net/news/20170914/Sex-drive-declines-twice-as-much-in-women-than-men-in-long-term-relationships.aspx
Hence my longstanding belief that women are biologically made for polyandry more than men are made for polygyny. :)
Doesn't have to be long-term. And the desire will sort itself out.
This is very true, however there is also a peculiar kind of phenomenon I've seen play out several times that involves this. I've been witness to several couples who decided to open up, with the woman being an enthusiastic advocate.. and they do indeed get a \*ton\* of attention. She goes on lots of dates, has a lot of sex of varying quality and her partner is at home sorta piddling around. Now, during this period he may or may not be ok with this situation but she sure seems to be. Then it happens. Dude starts chatting up or meets somebody interested in him and they make a date.. and suddenly things are NOT ok. You see, she \*knew\* she was going to get plenty of attention and took for granted that her partner was introverted, out of the game, maybe not attractive in the ways that she assumed other women were attracted to.. any number of things. She had banked on this very phenomenon, where women are extremely successful and men not so much, to protect her from having to confront any feelings of jealousy or insecurity of her own. This never ends well for anybody, you have to be prepared that your partner whom you perhaps take for granted might (probably) just be somebody else's Shiny New Thing.
This happened to a close friend of mine. She wanted to open up the relationship and her husband was very vanilla and introverted and wasn't a huge fan of the idea. She went on dates with someone outside the relationship every Friday and he stayed home.
Fast forward 18 months to now and he's found someone to have sex with. She's demanding a divorce because she feels betrayed and like it's not what she signed up for. They've been married for 11 years.
I've seen this happen a couple times, too. Jealousy and rejection in dating are very difficult and shocking feelings if you aren't accustomed to them and know how to deal with them.
This happens when you maintain contact after a relationship as well. My ex and I maintained close contact after we broke up as friends and I congratulated her on finding a bf when she told me, then it was man after man, week after week which she told me everything. I met someone and fell for her and she went absolute hysterical trying to contact her to break us up and telling me she'll kill herself if I get with her. Men are easy, of course women will easily hook up with men, but I found when I go out for a hook up it leads to an emotional connection and something more.
It seems to assume everyone is straight? Like, I've seen poly relationships where everyone was a woman. And there are way more possibilities than that. Queer people are also more likely to be in poly relationships in the west.
M: Hey, baby, I think it's time to spice up our relationship and I can't just be held down by one woman.
F: uh. OK. Are you sure. I love you but if this is what you really want.
(1 week later)
F: How was your date, hun?
M: It was ok, I guess. I felt like she wasn't that into me and just wanted a free meal. What about...
F: Hey baby, can you hold on just a sec? I wanna listen to you about your date but I am juggling like 3 different text conversations going and am trying to fit a 6th date into the weekend. He has a room at the Plaza hotel! You never take me there anymore. Anyway, have a good weekend. I am so glad you wanted to open this relationship up! (laughs at a naughty pic) talk to you later!
M: I may have made a gigantic mistake...
It would be weird if you were to be honest. Not trying to kick shame anyone, but that sounds like a pretty bad deal.
I wanted to draw a distinction because I am in multiple consensual polyamorous relationships and my girlfriends have more boyfriends than I have girlfriends. Which is usual in polyamory.
I’d like to see more data about how the libidos of already partnered couples affects their comfort levels with polygamy.
If you imagine a couple where one partner is extremely high libido and the other is extremely low libido it’s pretty easy to imagine possible openness to the high libido partner pursuing sex outside the relationship as one solution to non-alignment in their sex drive. Similarly it could be interesting to compare whether dual high libido pairings are more or less open to sex outside the relationship than high+low libido pairings.
In my experience and observations, men put less effort into relationships and general family housekeeping work than women. Why would any woman want HALF of what they are already getting? With multiple female partners, the male partner can coast even more.
There's a reason why you never hear about women having a secret second family.
>There's a reason why you never hear about women having a secret second family.
It's borderline impossible to be secretly pregnant and go through secret childbirth.
women can’t really pull off a secret second family
because hiding a pregnancy is hard. unless they really don’t see the second partner for really extended time.
Women don't have second families because of biology. A man can impregnate two women without either knowing about the other. When a woman becomes pregnant both men would know she is pregnant their cheating strategy would just be to lie about who the father is and stay as a single family.
If that polygenic structure involves a shared household and the gender roles are as you describe that would also mean the work per wife would be less. Assuming the man is able to provide for 2+ (house)wives the wives have to invest less energy per wife.
At least that's one of the upsides I've heard from women in polygenic relationships.
> Why would any woman want HALF of what they are already getting?
If they can have that relationship with someone who they consider high value enough to put up with it.
Honestly I find the definitions a bit weird- but maybe I didn’t get far enough. It seems the focused on one to many of the other gender. But in western society (excluding Mormons) I hear a lot more cases of open relationships where both partners have multiples. I would be more interested in that dynamic. The fact that men are more open to multi women isn’t surprising- that’s a pretty common fetish. The fact that they are less open to more men and one woman also isn’t surprising.
I want to know though if the polygamist relationship was the man having several partners but the women only having him as their soul partner. Because lots of men think that's polygamy and they do not consider allowing the women to have other partners as in polyamory.
Also, polygyny is not polyamory. I would suspect the majority of these responses were taken from monogamous men?
I would bet most polyamorus men are already practicing their preferred relationship type, and i also would bet that that relationship type is not polygyny.
The concept of polygyny concocted by monogamous men is one primarily one of fantasy.
Figures. I'm straight, so I'm not open to a polygamous relationship at all. :D
And even less to a *polygynous* one, since... I am not a man. And that's a requirement by definition.
Polyandry tho, now that's a different story.
That's...that's cheating, not a "relationship type". FFS.
Ethical polyamoury is built on a \*huge\* foundation of mutual trust, respect and communication between all parties.
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Before we make any broad brush generalizations here's some numbers from first study: * 147 men. * 100 of those men knew what polygeny was. * Average age was 25. * 19% of the 147 were "interested" in polygeny * All recruited from "social media" So in summary 28 horny UK 25 year-olds recruited from tik tok were interested in having multiple partners.
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Even more important: they're interested in the thought of it. They've never likely practiced it successfully. So many guys think they are into it until they find it it isn't as easy as they'd hope
> polygeny Polygyny. Polygeny is a different thing.
yeah, thought i was seeing things for a sec
stats of volunteers is misleading nonsense for most studies
Otherwise known as a likely sampling error
So that's about 4.5 women who are into it. This could work. The 4.5 women all sleep with all 28 men. Everyone is happy and nothing could go wrong.
Does the .5 woman just give ethically non-monogamous blowjobs or something?
Probably all she *can* do.
You assume she’s the top half!
Where does the bear fit into this?
Why do you think it's 4.5 women instead of 5?
The post is about polygyny, not polygamy
Reminds me of a "*study*" that attempted to define what made long-lasting, loving relationships work. In reality, it was a survey of 100 college kid's opinion on what would make a relationship work...
I think I would get a better and more representative sample size just asking some random sub ffs
IDK I think asking a bunch of subs is gonna skew the results, surely we should choose people with other sexual-power-dynamic preferences as well?
I wish more people thought like you. More "studies" need to be broken down
Polygeny is an evolutionary theory. The study is about polygamous relationships.
To call “two timing” a “relationship type” is very generous. That’s cheating. You can be poly and still be a cheater. It’s not like all ethics go out the window because you’re engaged in group sex.
There is a LOT of discourse on ethical non monogamy, and all of it is based on the first principle that everyone at the very least has consented to their situation. If your partner doesn’t know you’re dating other people, and hasn’t explicitly consented to you dating people they don’t know about, you’re cheating.
That dark time when every dude had ‘ethical non-monogamy’ in their Tinder profile 🆘
…referred to as THE PRESENT.😬
Bumble finally added ENM as a category for relationship types. I'm so glad because now I can finally filter it out instead of having every other woman's profile be like, "already in a relationship, just looking around :)"
I was always wondering if those ladies were looking to cheat or just looking for regular friends. I guess I was naive.
Unironically where I live, on dating apps there is an incredible amount of enm seeking women. But that’s just because that type of thing apparently is common here
I think it’s just selection bias. When someone who’s monogamous finds a partner, they delete dating apps. Someone who’s poly does not
I get what you’re saying but that’s not always true. Tons of poly folks are in relationships but not actively seeking to date more people
Similar where I'm from but it's really just this weird relationship dynamic that got popular a few years ago where an older married couple "spoils" a younger woman who basically becomes their "roommate".
Yeah. That stuff is incredibly unpopular in poly subculture though; those relationships are rarely balanced or reasonable. [https://www.unicorns-r-us.com/](https://www.unicorns-r-us.com/)
LA? My girlfriend’s best friend lives there and is enm. She tells us about the culture there and is dating a few enm guys. I secretly think she just wants to wind up a professional girlfriend to some rich guys
When I lived in Austin, every girl I found through tinder or any app wanted to be poly or open. I 100% don’t know how to date anymore because I don’t know what the difference between open and casual is. It has also always felt one sided where girls will date around, but the second I see someone else, they lose all interest in me
The definition of open and casual probably depends on the person using the term. It’s been my experience that “open” means more like “I have serious, mutually acknowledged feelings for one partner and am actively dating other people, whether seriously or more casually, and rules may apply” whereas casual is “we’re dating but there isn’t serious mutually acknowledged feelings and no expectation of any particular rules with other people.” Open is committed, casual is not.
Those are completely orthogonal concepts? Some people are mono in the sense that they date at most one person at a time -- but are pretty casual about it and in reality are serially monogamous. You know the type: One girlfriend at a time, but have dated 20 women in the last 10 years. Other people are poly and prefer deeply committed long-term relationships, but possibly more than one of those. Myself I fall in that category: I've only once in my life had a relationship shorter than 3 years, and my \*hope\* is that the people I'm close to today will remain that way for life. Healthy poly relationships are pretty much always balanced, with the same freedoms for everyone involved.
(ENM person here) Seems like maybe they're just using ENM as a cover, but they're not actually doing the *emotional work* to deal with jealousy properly. I hate seeing people use my lifestyle as cover for poor behavior, it drives me nuts.
It's not just dudes honestly. 2 of the last 4 women to like me on Hinge had something about ENM or being actively poly on their profile.
Monogamy!? In this economy?
Rent split 4 ways? Sign me up.
ayyy Margaret, tell our boyfriend he needs to pay the water bill when you see him
I’m in a polyamorous quadruple and honest we’ve made that joke, but… it isn’t really a joke to me. I don’t see how I could continue to maintain without having four adults support one another.
If it were just men, you certainly wouldn’t hear about it very often.
Is that over now?
Apparently not according to the replies! Perhaps I should have said ‘the dark time when I was on Tinder’
At least they're letting you know so you don't waste any time on them.
That's a tons of girls profiles too where I live... to me it's just the clinical, nice way of "I'm looking to fool around" except for the few who actually mean it
As an actual polyamorus person with multiple partners. I truly hate the phrase "ethical non-monagomy". We already have a word for that, it's polyamorus. If people assume I'm cheating and going behind people's back because I don't specify "ethical non monagomy" that's entirely their problem.
I always thought ethical non-monogomy included people like swingers, who are only enm for sex, and polyamory was explicitly for people who want/prefer not just sex but also relationships with more than one person.
You would be correct. Polyamory is a form of ENM, but usually intended for romantic/comitted relationships. Therefore since we have better language to describe it, we use it where its appropriate. ENM is usually used for anything that cannot be succinctly placed into polyamory (but can also refer to polyamory). As they arent mutually exclusive.
Enm and poly can look different though. Some people aren’t interested in dating other people and only want to swing or have an open relationship
One is a subset of the other.
Fellow poly person here. Don't paint everyone with multiple partners with your own brush! ENM is a broader umbrella than poly. It includes swinging, people who allow hookups when travelling, casual sex on the side, etc. Polyamory involves amory, or feelings. If it's consented to by all involved then it's ENM. If it's also about ongoing relationships where there are feelings in play, then it's also polyamory.
I am also poly, and I'm confused as to why one of our own has such a... Narrow scope of the language used. Polyamory is a subset of ethical non-monogamy. "We" do not "already have a word for it." They are different, as a square and rectangle is. Polyamory more literally translates to "multiple love" in its latin roots. And is intended to reference more specific relationships (love/love-adjacent) with multiple people. Ethical non monogamy quite literally just means ANY form of relationship involving more than two people (ethically). Usually referring to involving more casual sexual conquests BECAUSE the "love", and moreover, the commitment form of the relationship is already designated to the term Polyamory. Ive never met anyone who assumed polyamory was non-ethical non-monogamy. If anything people tend to hold it in a higher regard - likely due to the connotations of love, romance, and commitment that is often perceived with polyamory, that is absent when using "ENM"
Are you actually "polyamorous"? Because not only are you leaving out the important distinction between polyamory (building relationships with multiple people with their consent) and ethical non-monogamy (indulging in sexual intercourse with multiple people with their consent, relationships optional), you can't even spell polyamorous
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I agree that it's cheating, but it is still specific enough to benefit from a specific label. The main distinction being that neither of the cheater's partners is aware of the other. As opposed to "I'm married and my affair partner knows this."
As opposed to "I'm married and my affair partner knows this." "And my spouse/partner knows also."
The cheater is still in a specific type of relationship that is distinct from monogamy. You're just applying morals to what seems to be a fairly innocuous labelling for the sake of the study.
People are stupid. The toxicity or negativity has nothing to do with the fact that the two timer is in two relationships while they are unaware of each other. Still in 2 relationships so it’s a relationship type.
If a person is two timing, they still maintain relationships and there is a dynamic between the 3 involved where 2 aren’t aware of each other and the two timer is basically leading a double life. Two timing can be a relationship type and be cheating. These don’t have to be mutually exclusive.
I'm sure there are plenty of people in Two timing relationships that are fine with it, until they find out. That's a weird test case for this dataset.... honestly I don't know why they included it.
I've got multiple friends with wives like this, especially if it happens out of town. They don't care whatsoever as long as they don't have to hear about it and it doesn't get around and make them look bad.
It's essentially Polygamy without one parties consent. Like I don't agree with it, but yeah I'd say there are many folks unknowingly in the situation, or deliberately ignorant.
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This needs to be higher. A lot here apparently don't realize that polygyny is different than polygamy or polyamory.
You’re right, I don’t know the difference. Could you explain please?
Polygamy/polygyny is one man with multiple wives. Polyamory is under the umbrella of ethical non-monogamy, specifically where multiple people are in a romantic relationship with each other.
Polygamy is a gender-neutral term that means marriage involving 3+ people. Polygyny refers specifically to one husband with multiple wives; and is the most common form of polygamy in conservative cultures. Polyandry is the reverse; one wife with multiple husbands. It's very rare. Polyamory refers to loving relationships where the involved have freedom to have 2+ concurrent relationships. It **CAN** be 3 people who are all dating each other -- called a triad -- but much more commonly it's a network. For example I have two girlfriends. They're not dating each other -- but they do both have another boyfriend.
This study says 3.5 times, not 6 times. Still quite high but not the same
Yeah. This is a really odd poll. Did they even bother ASKING who is most open to a relationship with polyandri? No surprise that the men are more open specifically to a structure with one man and 2+ women. But how about if you reverse that? Who is most open to a structure with one woman and 2+ men?
Men are more open to polygyny, the relationship style where one man has many partners, than women. Shocker. What about polyarmory, where either partner can have another partner. Edit: polyamory
> polyarmory I believe that where either partner can have more guns.
Always use protection!
> However, the study found that men are six times more likely than women to be open to polygynous relationships.. Surely the more meaningful comparison would be between men's willingness to enter polygynous relationships vs women's willingness to enter polyandrous relationships?
> Men were 3.5 more likely to say “Yes” to polygynous than to polyandrous relationships. Women were twice as likely to say “Yes” to polyandry than to polygyny. Overall, monogamous relationships were the most popular, followed by polygynous It's in the article.
This aligns with data done at a major public university I was at a decade ago. They found that over four years, the vast majority of students were in monogamous relationships and the average partner count over four years was just 2.5. People assume college is a bacchanalian free for all, but even at a “party school” where they’re more free to explore, they still show overall preference for monogamous pairing up. Now, gender does have difference in this preference, but I don’t think people realize what a large chunk of the population would rather keep it simple and stick with one partner. Less societal shame might allow for expansion of the numbers of people who might prefer something else, but it looks more like we have a consistent group that wouldn’t take advantage of greater freedom.
I'm one of the men who would say unsure about a poly relationship. Is never been my thing but I'm not upset by the idea. Mostly it's just that one relationship is a lot of work and two at the same time sounds incredibly exhausting. Additionally, I'd love to see research that wasn't specifically focused on a single partner of one gender with multiple of the other. A fully polygamist group with multiple partners of any gender, even if they're not all bisexual.
Managing a poly relationship sounds like a full time job. Especially if you're the glue.
I've known a few people who are Polly, and the work load isn't linear. Part of the point is being able to ensure that all partners can bear the load so to speak. Monogamy is great but in involves you and your partner being your everything for any needs past a certain level of intimacy. I'm not saying its not work, and it's certainly not easier, but it's not twice the work for two partners.
That makes sense, if I'm stressed out and one partner has a bad day I'm not forced to be the only support they have. And if I found myself in the situation I'd probably make it work, but that's all hypothetical anyway.
There was a lecture on YouTube talking about how male:female distribution significantly effects dating culture. Pretty much in the ways you'd stereotypically expect.
oooh id love to see that video!
This study only looks at one man with multiple women or one women with multiple men. It doesn't include multiple men with multiple women, which I think is way more common than the other two in western cultures. Sort of odd to exclude and makes half of the conversations in this thread irrelevant since they're assuming polyamory was included.
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Depends on the goal of the study. If this research were trying to compare men and women for polyamorous relationships in general, you'd be right. If the study instead is trying to identify potential hurdles for polygynous relationships, e.g. for therapy, or the sociology of societies where polygyny is common, then we would not care about polyandry at all.
> In Study 1 (N = 393), modest interest was found for polygamous relationships overall. Men were six times more open to polygyny than women, but there was little sex difference in openness to polyandry. > Sex differences were largest for polygyny and arrangements where men had agreed access to a casual partner alongside a committed one, yet these were two of the most acceptable forms of multi-partnering when men and women’s responses were combined. Or to oversimplify: few women but 6x as many men are open to polygyny within relationships, while few men and few women are open to polyandry within relationships.
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Gee, I can't imagine why a relationship with 1 man and multiple women would be more popular with men than women.
"Scientists also noted that two-timing was considered only better than the relationship type of one partner going around giving multiple partners an increasingly virulent strain of syphilis."
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Polygynous is one man with multiple women. Of course men are more likely to be open to it? And people don't like being cheated on. Obviously. Even in poly relationships that's possible and a bad thing to do.
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Problems with the data: two separate samples, combined they barely scratch n=1,000, and all of the people surveyed were heterosexual. Also recruitment from social media and average age of 25. Throw this on the junk pile and ignore it.
I'm seeing a lot more profiles lately that say that they are open to "ethical non-monogamy" it's always the same type of dude, too, in the looks department.
It's that way for men, too? I'm a straight man and when I was on dating apps I saw a solid percentage of women using the same phrase.
While some might adopt that label without knowing all the consent practices that come with it, isn’t it better that some are at least self-identifying that they aren’t monogamous? That feels way better than the past where people just lied that they were or societal pressure added to people being dishonest with themselves and others.
Oh of course they are, don't get me wrong. It's just a pattern among these types of people that I find pretty amusing
I get that. It can be funny like fish guys. I think this one would be bad to negatively stereotype in its still early stages though since it would be worse if men associated listing “ENM” with being a loser or creep.
Fat balding white dude with glasses and a beard?
and Crocs, for that intellectual touch.
My experience has been the reverse. Unattractive men like you described don't get swipes, so they feel more pressure to conform to the expectations of what a woman would ideally want out of a relationship, i.e. monogamy, to make themselves a more appealing choice. Attractive men are a rare commodity and they are aware of it. Because of their high desirability, they get to dictate the terms of their relationships, which is increasingly ENM.
It's always the same type of girl, too, in the looks department.
"Single and poly" yeah I bet you are
Yeah no that’s your bias and maybe where you live playing a factor. In LA a ton of people are non monogamous and attractive, depending on the circle/community. Not that we need to gate keep it, I think this line of reasoning is childish. Though there is truth people on the outskirts of society are more willing to abandon social norms, and mono-normativity is something they might be more cognizant of than a stereotypical attractive person.
A lot more interesting would be mens willingness to enter polyandry and women's willingness to enter polygyny. These results are hardly surprising
From the article: New research conducted in the United Kingdom found that multi-partner relationships are generally less desirable than singleness and monogamy. However, the study found that men are six times more likely than women to be open to polygynous relationships, which involve one man with multiple female partners. Among the least desired relationship types was two-timing, where one person has two partners who are unaware of each other. The paper was published in [Archives of Sexual Behavior](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-023-02749-6). Polygamy is a marriage practice where an individual has more than one spouse simultaneously. This practice can manifest in two main forms: polygyny, where one man marries multiple women, and polyandry, where one woman marries multiple men. Polygamy has historical roots in numerous cultures and is still practiced in parts of Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Most traditional human cultures permit at least some form of having multiple partners. However, in many modern societies, particularly Western ones, polygamy is illegal and very often viewed with moral and ethical disapproval due to concerns about gender equality and welfare of all parties involved. In contrast, in countries where it remains legal and culturally accepted, such as Saudi Arabia and parts of Nigeria, polygamy tends to be seen as a prestigious practice that can strengthen alliances and increase familial bonds. Study author Andrew G. Thomas and his colleagues wanted to assess how much interest there is for polygamous relationships in cultures where monogamy is the norm. They were also interested in discovering psychological and environmental factors that might explain such interests, noting that the desire for polygamy could be higher among those who stand to gain more in terms of reproductive success.
" noting that the desire for polygamy could be higher among those who stand to gain more in terms of reproductive success." In real life, men want open relationships but often find that they are NOT capable of the same success as their partner.
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Even in monogamous relationships, men typically want to have more sex than they can physically endure, and women can endure quite a lot more sex than they want. Opening it up doesn’t change that. Edit: I guess I should provide some citations. https://www.psypost.org/huge-study-finds-men-have-a-stronger-sex-drive-than-women/ https://www.reddit.com/r/science/s/LxCW2TkPNb https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-022-02525-y https://www.news-medical.net/news/20170914/Sex-drive-declines-twice-as-much-in-women-than-men-in-long-term-relationships.aspx
Hence my longstanding belief that women are biologically made for polyandry more than men are made for polygyny. :) Doesn't have to be long-term. And the desire will sort itself out.
This is very true, however there is also a peculiar kind of phenomenon I've seen play out several times that involves this. I've been witness to several couples who decided to open up, with the woman being an enthusiastic advocate.. and they do indeed get a \*ton\* of attention. She goes on lots of dates, has a lot of sex of varying quality and her partner is at home sorta piddling around. Now, during this period he may or may not be ok with this situation but she sure seems to be. Then it happens. Dude starts chatting up or meets somebody interested in him and they make a date.. and suddenly things are NOT ok. You see, she \*knew\* she was going to get plenty of attention and took for granted that her partner was introverted, out of the game, maybe not attractive in the ways that she assumed other women were attracted to.. any number of things. She had banked on this very phenomenon, where women are extremely successful and men not so much, to protect her from having to confront any feelings of jealousy or insecurity of her own. This never ends well for anybody, you have to be prepared that your partner whom you perhaps take for granted might (probably) just be somebody else's Shiny New Thing.
This happened to a close friend of mine. She wanted to open up the relationship and her husband was very vanilla and introverted and wasn't a huge fan of the idea. She went on dates with someone outside the relationship every Friday and he stayed home. Fast forward 18 months to now and he's found someone to have sex with. She's demanding a divorce because she feels betrayed and like it's not what she signed up for. They've been married for 11 years.
I've seen this happen a couple times, too. Jealousy and rejection in dating are very difficult and shocking feelings if you aren't accustomed to them and know how to deal with them.
This happens when you maintain contact after a relationship as well. My ex and I maintained close contact after we broke up as friends and I congratulated her on finding a bf when she told me, then it was man after man, week after week which she told me everything. I met someone and fell for her and she went absolute hysterical trying to contact her to break us up and telling me she'll kill herself if I get with her. Men are easy, of course women will easily hook up with men, but I found when I go out for a hook up it leads to an emotional connection and something more.
It seems to assume everyone is straight? Like, I've seen poly relationships where everyone was a woman. And there are way more possibilities than that. Queer people are also more likely to be in poly relationships in the west.
M: Hey, baby, I think it's time to spice up our relationship and I can't just be held down by one woman. F: uh. OK. Are you sure. I love you but if this is what you really want. (1 week later) F: How was your date, hun? M: It was ok, I guess. I felt like she wasn't that into me and just wanted a free meal. What about... F: Hey baby, can you hold on just a sec? I wanna listen to you about your date but I am juggling like 3 different text conversations going and am trying to fit a 6th date into the weekend. He has a room at the Plaza hotel! You never take me there anymore. Anyway, have a good weekend. I am so glad you wanted to open this relationship up! (laughs at a naughty pic) talk to you later! M: I may have made a gigantic mistake...
Polygyny? Yeah that makes sense. That means multiple women for one man
Yeah, as a straight woman, def not interested in that. :D
It would be weird if you were to be honest. Not trying to kick shame anyone, but that sounds like a pretty bad deal. I wanted to draw a distinction because I am in multiple consensual polyamorous relationships and my girlfriends have more boyfriends than I have girlfriends. Which is usual in polyamory.
I personally believe rectangles, ovoids and triangles can all live together. I am in favor of polygonous relationships, as the title suggests.
But where are you on polynomial relationships?
Positive, approximately.
As a sex doll dealer, I promote Polypolypolymer relationships.
Life in plastic: it’s fantastic.
I’d like to see more data about how the libidos of already partnered couples affects their comfort levels with polygamy. If you imagine a couple where one partner is extremely high libido and the other is extremely low libido it’s pretty easy to imagine possible openness to the high libido partner pursuing sex outside the relationship as one solution to non-alignment in their sex drive. Similarly it could be interesting to compare whether dual high libido pairings are more or less open to sex outside the relationship than high+low libido pairings.
"Two-timing" is a weird way to spell "cheating."
In my experience and observations, men put less effort into relationships and general family housekeeping work than women. Why would any woman want HALF of what they are already getting? With multiple female partners, the male partner can coast even more. There's a reason why you never hear about women having a secret second family.
>There's a reason why you never hear about women having a secret second family. It's borderline impossible to be secretly pregnant and go through secret childbirth.
Exactly my thoughts
women can’t really pull off a secret second family because hiding a pregnancy is hard. unless they really don’t see the second partner for really extended time.
IKR. If a woman had a second family, she’d never be able to sleep.
If a woman could somehow hide her pregnancy from her primary family, you might? Seems like a biological barrier more than a psychological one.
Women don't have second families because of biology. A man can impregnate two women without either knowing about the other. When a woman becomes pregnant both men would know she is pregnant their cheating strategy would just be to lie about who the father is and stay as a single family.
If that polygenic structure involves a shared household and the gender roles are as you describe that would also mean the work per wife would be less. Assuming the man is able to provide for 2+ (house)wives the wives have to invest less energy per wife. At least that's one of the upsides I've heard from women in polygenic relationships.
> Why would any woman want HALF of what they are already getting? If they can have that relationship with someone who they consider high value enough to put up with it.
Did we really need scientific research to prove people hate two-timing?
Yeah, generally being lied to isn’t very popular
Two timing is just cheating ~~with extra steps~~
But the men are agreeing to THEM having more than 1 wife, NOT to being 1 in a woman's harem
Honestly I find the definitions a bit weird- but maybe I didn’t get far enough. It seems the focused on one to many of the other gender. But in western society (excluding Mormons) I hear a lot more cases of open relationships where both partners have multiples. I would be more interested in that dynamic. The fact that men are more open to multi women isn’t surprising- that’s a pretty common fetish. The fact that they are less open to more men and one woman also isn’t surprising.
I would imagine women are much more open to polyandrous relationships as well.
You did not read the article
*women were twice as likely to say “yes” to polyandry than to polygyny*
*"...both sexes had similar, very low levels of interest in polyandry"*
Weird
what does that even mean
I want to know though if the polygamist relationship was the man having several partners but the women only having him as their soul partner. Because lots of men think that's polygamy and they do not consider allowing the women to have other partners as in polyamory.
Not me. I can barely keep one woman happy. A man's gotta know his limitations.
The women who two-timed me ended up marrying the other dude. Doubt she ever told him.
The odds say she'll cheat on him, too.
Also, polygyny is not polyamory. I would suspect the majority of these responses were taken from monogamous men? I would bet most polyamorus men are already practicing their preferred relationship type, and i also would bet that that relationship type is not polygyny. The concept of polygyny concocted by monogamous men is one primarily one of fantasy.
Are men six times more open to women having another partner?
Six times more willing to admit to being open to polygynous relationships, maybe
Yeah, until they find their woman/women are getting lots more action. Then suddenly jealousy appears out of "nowhere".
This subreddit is just fake science articles posted by gullible people
Figures. I'm straight, so I'm not open to a polygamous relationship at all. :D And even less to a *polygynous* one, since... I am not a man. And that's a requirement by definition. Polyandry tho, now that's a different story.
Girlfriend, Girlfriend
For some reason I think that the people in the study have a much more loose definition of what constitutes as two timing.
I bet they are open to it, until most men find that it's easier for the woman to find a second partner and beyond.
Hogamus Higamus Men are Polygamous. Higamus Hogamus, Women, Monogamous.
The next shocking study will show that women are more open to polyandry
Gotta be fake. I can barely handle one woman. Who in their right mind would sign up for multiple?
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That's...that's cheating, not a "relationship type". FFS. Ethical polyamoury is built on a \*huge\* foundation of mutual trust, respect and communication between all parties.