0
SPEAKER_00
Welcome back to The School of Greatness, one of the top-ranked podcasts in the world.
0
SPEAKER_00
Today, we welcome the inspiring Macken Murphy.
0
SPEAKER_00
And Macken isn t just a behavior scientist, he s a master at decoding the little things we do and say that reveal a lot about our relationships and what we re really looking for in love and life.
0
SPEAKER_00
Whether you re single, dating, or just love understanding more about the people around you, Macken s insights today are going to open your eyes to the complex world of
0
SPEAKER_00
human attraction.
0
SPEAKER_00
I m so excited for you to dive in, so let the class begin.
0
SPEAKER_01
I spent a couple years at Oxford studying infidelity.
0
SPEAKER_01
Narcissism is associated with infidelity.
0
SPEAKER_01
Plenty of people find sexual narcissism sexy, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
So that someone who believes that they re the best lover ever and is, you know, totally confident in bed, that also predicts infidelity.
0
SPEAKER_00
Now, Macken Murphy isn t just a behavior scientist, he s a master at decoding the little things we do and say that reveal a lot about our relationships and what we re really looking for in love and life.
0
SPEAKER_00
Macken s insights are going to open your eyes to the complex world of human attraction.
0
SPEAKER_01
The symptoms of PTSD are so common among people who have been cheated on that some psychologists have coined the term and used the term PISD, post-infidelity stress disorder.
0
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
0
SPEAKER_00
What is the research that stands out to you the most around love relationships and intimacy in a modern world?
0
SPEAKER_01
The research on what we know impacts success in romantic relationships.
0
SPEAKER_01
So there are very simple things that you can do to improve your romantic connection with someone.
0
SPEAKER_00
What would you say are the three clear signs that a man may cheat on his partner that he s committed to?
0
SPEAKER_00
I don t even know if I should share this, but...
0
SPEAKER_00
Welcome back, everyone, to the School of Greatness.
0
SPEAKER_00
I am very excited about our guest.
0
SPEAKER_00
We have the inspiring Macken Murphy in the house.
0
SPEAKER_00
Good to see you.
0
SPEAKER_00
I don t know about inspiring, but thank you.
0
SPEAKER_00
Very excited, because I wouldn t say I discovered you, but I found your content before a lot of people knew about you.
0
SPEAKER_00
And I still don t think really many people know about you yet.
0
SPEAKER_00
So I want to introduce you.
0
SPEAKER_00
from what I saw online.
0
SPEAKER_00
Now, Mackenmurphy isn t just a behavior scientist.
0
SPEAKER_00
He s a master at decoding the little things we do and say that reveal a lot about our relationships and what we re really looking for in love and life.
0
SPEAKER_00
So whether you re single, dating, or you re just
0
SPEAKER_00
Love understanding more about people around you.
0
SPEAKER_00
Macken s insights are going to open your eyes to the complex world of human attraction.
0
SPEAKER_00
And you re a scientist, you re a researcher, and you ve studied a lot of different things around animal mating theory and history of animal mating, but also human mating.
0
SPEAKER_00
And your content on TikTok is what, how I found you and what made me really interested about the depth of research that you dive into and study on the science of love and relationships.
0
SPEAKER_00
And we were just talking about this before about a few different key things that people are interested in a lot these days, infidelity, cheating.
0
SPEAKER_00
why people cheat, why it s important for men and women to try to become more beautiful, jealousy, insecurity, all these different things that people are struggling with or trying to understand about themselves and others.
0
SPEAKER_00
And so I m excited to dive into this.
0
SPEAKER_00
The first thing I want to talk about is infidelity and cheating.
0
SPEAKER_00
Sure.
0
SPEAKER_00
Why do you think people are cheaters or cheat at one point?
0
SPEAKER_00
What is the main cause of cheating that you ve seen?
0
SPEAKER_00
And do men cheat more than women?
0
SPEAKER_01
Okay, well that s a very complicated question.
0
SPEAKER_01
I ll say up front that infidelity in the animal literature is just called extra pair copulation, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
This is, you have your in-pair mate, the primary partner, and there are many people think monogamy is, you know, this kind of unnatural social construct.
0
SPEAKER_01
That s an idea I run up against quite a bit.
0
SPEAKER_01
But monogamy, there are plenty of monogamous animals.
0
SPEAKER_01
I would say that we are a serially monogamous species of ape.
0
SPEAKER_01
That s a slightly controversial thing to say.
0
SPEAKER_01
But we re serially socially monogamous.
0
SPEAKER_01
Infidelity, extra pair copulation, the propensity to have sexual intercourse with people who are not your mate, the inclination towards that, that s also part of our evolutionary story.
0
SPEAKER_01
Now, you asked about why people cheat and whether men cheat more than women.
0
SPEAKER_01
Whether men cheat more than women, I ll start on that because that s, I mean, it s a controversial thing to say on the internet.
0
SPEAKER_01
It would be a controversial thing to write on a blog, but in a human mating behavior lab, somewhere that actually studies infidelity, this would be one of the most banal things you could ever say, which is that men do cheat more than women.
0
SPEAKER_01
Now, I m not saying that nobody disagrees with this.
0
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying that there aren t some researchers who say, you know, maybe there s more evenness here, or maybe women actually cheat more.
0
SPEAKER_01
And maybe in some subpopulations, right, in circumspect sociocologies, and in some age groups, maybe infidelity rates vary.
0
SPEAKER_01
But what do we see?
0
SPEAKER_01
Well, we see that in general, right,
0
SPEAKER_01
Heterosexual women report getting cheated on more than heterosexual men.
0
SPEAKER_01
So you ask people, have you ever been cheated on?
0
SPEAKER_01
Women are more likely to say they have been.
0
SPEAKER_01
And then when you ask people, have you ever cheated?
0
SPEAKER_01
Men tend to say, yeah, more.
0
SPEAKER_01
So men admit to cheating more on these anonymous surveys.
0
SPEAKER_01
And you can say, well,
0
SPEAKER_01
survey data, self-report, maybe women are more likely to lie, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
But then, that s a bit of a silly thing to say because the research that we have on lying indicates that men are more duplicitous, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
Men lie more.
0
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying it s a big sex difference, but
0
SPEAKER_01
Anytime someone s tried to look into that, that I m aware of, it s tended to say, OK, men seem more apt towards lying.
0
SPEAKER_01
And then finally, the final piece of evidence on this, right, when we re saying how do we know that men cheat more is when you look at mate poachers.
0
SPEAKER_01
Right.
0
SPEAKER_01
So this is this is the the other person in the scenario.
0
SPEAKER_01
Right.
0
SPEAKER_01
The third party.
0
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
0
SPEAKER_01
The interloper.
0
SPEAKER_01
When you ask men and women, you know.
0
SPEAKER_01
Have you have you succeeded?
0
SPEAKER_01
You know, have you attempted mate poaching?
0
SPEAKER_01
Have you succeeded?
0
SPEAKER_01
For short-term mating, uncommitted mating, so there s two types of mate poaching.
0
SPEAKER_01
There s this infidelity that we re talking about, and then there s the second type, which is also infidelity, but you re starting a new relationship.
0
SPEAKER_01
It seems to be, at least in Western samples, and this is a less studied fact, that
0
SPEAKER_01
women who may poach have higher success.
0
SPEAKER_01
So when you take all those findings together.
0
SPEAKER_01
So women who are single and want to, if they want to take your boyfriend for a night, they ll have more success than men who want to take your girlfriend for a night on average.
0
SPEAKER_01
Why is that?
0
SPEAKER_01
Well, that s a great segue because we can now talk about, so those are the reasons to think that men cheat more than women.
0
SPEAKER_01
And why is that, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
Why do men cheat more than women?
0
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I m somewhat agnostic on the idea that it s still possible that men cheat more, but one theoretical thing to consider, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
If new research came out that showed women cheat more, I d be open to accepting it.
0
SPEAKER_01
I m not emotionally committed to any ideas.
0
SPEAKER_01
But one of the theoretical reasons to expect men to cheat more
0
SPEAKER_01
is that male mammals, humans are mammals, male mammals have a very powerful benefit from infidelity that female animals can t have, at least in the same way.
0
SPEAKER_01
And I m realizing just when I m speaking that
0
SPEAKER_01
I don t think infidelity is a good thing to do, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
I don t think cheating is a good thing to do.
0
SPEAKER_01
A lot of people, they might clip things I m saying and take it out of context.
0
SPEAKER_01
And when I m saying that infidelity is natural, it s evolved, a lot of people are saying that it s inevitable or think that I m saying that it s inevitable.
0
SPEAKER_01
It s not, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
Plenty of people, probably most people don t cheat or that it s good, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
But there are plenty of natural things that are bad, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
Like I also believe that under, in very niche circumstances, we have psychological adaptations to homicide, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
Killing people.
0
SPEAKER_01
I don t think that murder is okay, but I recognize that mammals sometimes kill each other, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
And that there are sometimes fitness benefits to engaging in such a risky activity.
0
SPEAKER_01
Don t please nobody clip me and say that I think homicide s okay.
0
SPEAKER_01
So going back to the topic, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
Why do men cheat more?
0
SPEAKER_01
One of the theoretical considerations that s worth bringing on board is the fact that male mammals, when they have multiple partners,
0
SPEAKER_01
can increase the number of offspring that they have, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
So for male mammals, to an extent, quantity has more benefits relative to female mammals, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
And obviously, gender and sex, these are complicated things that interface in complicated ways, but for the most part, men are male mammals, right, in general.
0
SPEAKER_01
Most men would be male mammals, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
And most women would be female mammals, right?
0
SPEAKER_01
And so men have this benefit to multiple mating that women generally don t have, which is that they can have multiple offspring.
0
SPEAKER_01
And this was in our ancestry.
0
SPEAKER_01
So I m an evolutionary behavioral scientist where I m interested in the evolution of human behavior.
0
SPEAKER_01
And so I m looking at how did this behavior benefit our ancestors?
0
SPEAKER_01
So obviously in a contraception context, having an affair isn t going to get you more offspring.
0
SPEAKER_01
But because male mammals can have multiple mates pregnant at one time, whereas female mammals can only be pregnant by one mate at a time, male mammals can expand their progeny by expanding the number of mates they have.
1
SPEAKER_01
But that doesn t work in a modern society.
1
SPEAKER_00
Not necessarily.
1
SPEAKER_00
It could.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, sometimes that still happens, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Children are born out of affairs, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
I won t name any sluggish names.
1
SPEAKER_01
I shouldn t say it doesn t work.
1
SPEAKER_01
But it s socially acceptable.
1
SPEAKER_00
No, certainly not.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I m not sure it ever was.
1
SPEAKER_01
And it doesn t bring harmony.
1
SPEAKER_00
in a relationship when that s happening.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I m not saying that that s a good, again, I m not saying it s a good thing to do.
1
SPEAKER_00
But I also want to note that, so that presence of that powerful benefit could be part of the reason why men cheat more, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Is that they have this additional benefit to infidelity that women don t necessarily have.
1
SPEAKER_00
But there are other reasons, I don t want to oversimplify it.
1
SPEAKER_00
I think a lot of people would hear that and they would say, okay, well, let s take that to the bank.
1
SPEAKER_00
Why do men cheat?
1
SPEAKER_00
They cheat because their male ancestors who had affairs had more offspring than their male ancestors who didn t have affairs.
1
SPEAKER_00
Not exactly right, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Infidelity is a tool that can be put to many purposes for an animal, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
And in humans, it s quite complicated because we also have these complex social structures, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
So yes, some people who cheat are driven by a desire for sexual variety that probably in males help to increase progeny, but other individuals, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
There are individual men who cheat, for example, to mate switch.
1
SPEAKER_00
to obtain a different mate.
1
SPEAKER_00
So they re with one woman and they want to be with a different woman and the infidelity is the way that they facilitate that.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that s true of women as well.
1
SPEAKER_00
Why not just break up first?
1
SPEAKER_00
David Buss has a funny quote on this.
1
SPEAKER_00
He said, why would you quit your job before looking for a new one?
1
SPEAKER_00
Why would you dump your partner before seeing what else is out there?
1
SPEAKER_01
You have some security, you have some familiarity, you have income, you have value from the exchange.
1
SPEAKER_00
So mate-switching is another reason women and men both mate-switch, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
And some scientists think that the main reason women cheat is to mate-switch.
1
SPEAKER_00
I won t weigh in on that, but that s one viewpoint.
1
SPEAKER_00
What is the research saying on why women cheat?
1
SPEAKER_00
Okay, well, again, it s similar to men where we have these many functions, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
So women and men both cheat to mate-switch to an extent.
1
SPEAKER_00
Women and men both cheat to
1
SPEAKER_00
frankly, get revenge on their partners for infidelity.
1
SPEAKER_00
And there s some published research that indicates that women might be more likely to cheat for revenge.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it s an open debate as to whether that s a genuine psychological tendency or whether it s just that they get cheated on more, and so they have more opportunities to actually pursue that strategy.
1
SPEAKER_00
Women in some societies, such as among the Himba of Namibia, this is an agro-pastoralist group,
1
SPEAKER_00
They have incredible rates of infidelity, much higher than we see in the West.
1
SPEAKER_00
Incredibly high rates of women s infidelity, female infidelity.
1
SPEAKER_00
And the main reason, based on a few studies from Brooke Schelza and Sean Prowl, who are brilliant scientists, and I ve spoken to them before and they were both a pleasure to speak to, their work indicates that in that socio-ecological setting, the primary reason that women cheat is to obtain multiple investors.
1
SPEAKER_00
Now, we see women cheat for multiple investors in the West as well, but it looks a little different.
1
SPEAKER_00
This would be the case where the woman is dating one guy and he s provisioning benefits to her in various ways, but then she s also got maybe, and this isn t a common thing, but maybe she s got kind of a sugar daddy type relationship on the side as well.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it s like, boyfriends do lots of good things for you.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so if you have multiple boyfriends, you can have more of those good things.
1
SPEAKER_00
And that seems to be a primary motivation among the Himba where it s a somewhat resource scarce situation.
1
SPEAKER_00
And so one of the benefits that women accrue through infidelity is they obtain multiple partners who are putting resources towards them and their offspring.
1
SPEAKER_01
More resources, more safety, more resources, more opportunities.
1
SPEAKER_00
More everything, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
So that s one reason that women cheat, and maybe to an extent men as well.
1
SPEAKER_00
I don t know how common that strategy is in the West, but it s certainly, again, it s important to understand it.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s certainly common there.
1
SPEAKER_00
So there s tons of reasons.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then another one, and this is the last one that I think I ll mention unless you want more, because there really are many strategies.
1
SPEAKER_00
So, the last potential reason that women have affairs, right, is to couple the, let s say, the indirect benefits of one partner with the direct benefits of another, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
So, indirect benefits are, some people call them conceptive benefits or genetic benefits, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
This is, you can have an affair, and this is something that we see in other animals, you can have an affair with a male who maybe has, you know, who s maybe healthier, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
Something like that.
1
SPEAKER_00
and then your offspring will be healthier.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then you can raise those children surreptitiously with the boyfriend who maybe is a better investor.
1
SPEAKER_00
But that s not particularly common.
1
SPEAKER_00
In Western pop, I don t want anyone to... It s not particularly common for this to actually... I m not saying that it doesn t have a profound influence on our modern psychology, the roots of this behavior.
1
SPEAKER_00
I would say that to an extent it does.
1
SPEAKER_00
And there s various pieces of evidence for that.
1
SPEAKER_00
But in terms of the actual execution of that strategy, very low frequency.
1
SPEAKER_00
Generally, like, I mean, on the internet, you hear all this nonsense about people saying, oh, the extra pair paternity rate, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
The rate of you are not the father is like 30%.
1
SPEAKER_00
And I m like, no, it s not.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s not.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s not.
1
SPEAKER_00
And nobody, please, nobody clip this.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s they say it s 30% because they go to paternity clinics where men who are already suspicious are looking to find out from those people from those people, which and it s like, okay, that s like going to that s like going to an auto shop to try and determine the rate of car crashes.
1
SPEAKER_00
If you look at general population studies, right studies where the where it s not self selected in this incredibly biased way, you see rates more like
1
SPEAKER_00
3% would be high.
1
SPEAKER_00
2% would be more normal.
1
SPEAKER_00
And generally, if you ask a scientist who studies paternity, they d say in Western samples, 1% to 2%.
1
SPEAKER_00
But in some groups, it s very high.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like among the Himba, again, from Namibia, it s like 50-50.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s 48%.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s 48%.
1
SPEAKER_00
But it s not a you-don t-know situation.
1
SPEAKER_00
There s a strange cultural context.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s worth noting.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s not a you-don t-know situation.
1
SPEAKER_00
They do know.
1
SPEAKER_01
being raised by a tribe, and the more men that are involved with a woman, the more likelihood they ll help take care of the child as well.
1
SPEAKER_00
Isn t that kind of that?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, kind of.
1
SPEAKER_00
That s actually, that s about right.
1
SPEAKER_00
And it s not the same setting.
1
SPEAKER_00
I mean, in the West, there s a debate as to whether it s even analogous, because in the West, when a man finds out, oh my God, my wife slept with someone else, and I m raising that guy s kid, that s the end of the relationship pretty consistently.
1
SPEAKER_00
That s a disaster.
1
SPEAKER_00
But among this group, it s like, yeah, I know that s not my kid, right?
1
SPEAKER_00
But I m going to raise him because he s right down the street or he s in the tribe or he s in the community or whatever.
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s just a different... This is a much more complicated question.
1
SPEAKER_00
And if you re interested in having a really good scientist who could tell you everything about that specific scenario, Brooke Schalza is the one to invite.
1
SPEAKER_00
But
1
SPEAKER_00
you re about right in the sense that it s multiple investors and that it s complex because there s, and this is going to be very foreign to people in a Western context, but there s status to be obtained from being a good parent to your wife s affair partner s children.
1
SPEAKER_00
And then there s also some complexity in the sense that maybe when these men were younger,
1
SPEAKER_00
they were the affair partner to, and as they age, they re getting some of that benefit back.
1
SPEAKER_00
So they were on the other side of it themselves.
1
SPEAKER_00
They ve played both sides of the field.
1
SPEAKER_00
They understand the game to an extent.
1
SPEAKER_01
I m curious, in the Western society and world, what s the science or the research on monogamy relationships versus polyamory relationships?
1
SPEAKER_01
And which ones are more beneficial?
1
SPEAKER_01
And which ones have more harmony, peace, and true love versus which ones causes more stress and destruction?
1
SPEAKER_01
Is there any science that shows polyamory is actually healthy, creates harmony, abundance with having multiple partners, each partner having multiple partners?
1
SPEAKER_01
What s the science of that?
1
SPEAKER_00
Well, you could say, given the fact that I spent a couple years at Oxford studying infidelity, you could say that I have some expertise on informal polyamory.
1
SPEAKER_00
But formal, what you re describing, formal polyamory.
1
SPEAKER_00
Like where they re both in on it.
1
SPEAKER_00
They re like, hey, we each have three partners.
1
SPEAKER_00
That s not really infidelity because they re faithful to the rules of their relationship.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s just that their rules are different.
1
SPEAKER_01
But based on research, has that worked for people in long-term relationships?
1
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, so what I was getting to is that that is just not my area of expertise.
1
SPEAKER_00
And other academics, you know, I really don t want to plant a flag here because a lot of other academics will speak on subjects that they haven t
1
SPEAKER_00
No, not other academics.
1
SPEAKER_00
That s actually not even the word I m trying to use.
1
SPEAKER_00
A lot of people on the internet, not necessarily academics, will speak as if they re an expert on everything.
1
SPEAKER_00
Whereas in academia, if you haven t spent at least a year on a topic, you really know very little about it.
1
SPEAKER_00
It s not a quick process to learn about a subject deeply.
1
SPEAKER_00
Now, if you know about a lot of related subjects, maybe you can get yourself up to speed quickly.
1
SPEAKER_01
Is there any research that you ve come about, whether you re the expert or not on it, in that category of polyamory versus monogamy?
1
SPEAKER_00
From a societal perspective, when you re comparing groups, it does seem that monogamy comes with tremendous social benefits, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
with economic benefits, it seems to come with social stability benefits, reduced violence, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, monogamy is a game where it s a table where everyone can potentially get a seat because it s one-to-one pairing, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
If you start mixing and matching, it seems that what the end result of opening the door to that is that you get single men who are excluded from the mating market and those men
2
SPEAKER_01
I m not and I have no political opinions on this, just to be clear.
2
SPEAKER_01
A lot of people sometimes hear facts and interpret them as advocating for.
2
SPEAKER_01
I m just saying that it is the case that if.
2
SPEAKER_01
you have tons of single men in an environment who have no romantic prospects, they re going to, they re going to, they have nothing to lose, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
They don t have as much of a stake in society.
2
SPEAKER_01
And they also have all this incentive to compete because it s like, well, I ve lost the game anyway.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s kind of like, you know, in boxing, let s say where it s like, you re already down on the scorecards.
2
SPEAKER_01
And now it s like, well,
2
SPEAKER_01
I m going to lose anyway.
2
SPEAKER_01
Let me just throw some Hail Marys.
2
SPEAKER_01
You become more violent because it s like, I can take these risks.
2
SPEAKER_01
And we see that in these young single men.
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, some people call it young male syndrome in my field.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s like they cause so much trouble.
2
SPEAKER_01
Really?
2
SPEAKER_01
If they re not in a monogamous relationship or committed relationship or
2
SPEAKER_01
That s certainly the theory.
2
SPEAKER_01
And some of the work by Joe Henrich is pretty interesting on this.
2
SPEAKER_01
I believe he actually testified in some Canadian thing.
2
SPEAKER_01
He s a professor at Harvard in any case, and he s done some of the work looking at the kind of societal effects of monogamy.
2
SPEAKER_01
And he s not, again, just like me, he would be in the business of what is rather than what should be.
2
SPEAKER_01
But he has observed it s like,
2
SPEAKER_01
Monogamy seems to be pretty good for the goose and the gander.
2
SPEAKER_01
For everyone.
2
SPEAKER_01
For society.
2
SPEAKER_01
For society.
2
SPEAKER_01
It also seems to be good for the people involved in it, but one note that I will make is that you might be able to run a study on people in polyamorous relationships and show that they re happier, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
Maybe.
2
SPEAKER_01
You might be able to.
2
SPEAKER_01
You might be able to.
2
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying that I know of that result, but those sorts of results mislead people.
2
SPEAKER_01
You really enjoy doing football, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
And if I showed you, I assume, and if I showed you a study that showed that people who play football are less happy, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
It s like, well, or sorry, people who don t play football are happier, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
You d be like, well, they...
2
SPEAKER_01
That doesn t mean that me being forced to quit football or quitting it will make me happier as an individual.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s like both people have selected themselves into those populations.
2
SPEAKER_01
A better example might be skydiving.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s like you might find out that people who skydive are much happier than the general population.
2
SPEAKER_01
And then it s like, oh, we should implement skydiving and everyone should skydive.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, no, they chose to do that, so they enjoy it.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it could be the same with polygamy.
2
SPEAKER_01
So I don t know if, in terms of, so you were asking a question about like, what s better?
2
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, it may be the case that polyamory is better for some people and monogamy is better for others.
2
SPEAKER_01
That would be my guess.
2
SPEAKER_00
But it sounds like, from your observation, that monogamy- Yeah, tentatively.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, from a social perspective, I will tentatively say that it s probably better for us to pair up and hang out.
2
SPEAKER_01
instead of just viciously competing sexually into our 30s and 40s.
2
SPEAKER_00
Right.
2
SPEAKER_00
What would you say are the three clear signs that a man may cheat on his partner that he s committed to?
2
SPEAKER_01
There are no clear signs in the sense that, well,
2
SPEAKER_01
I mean, if you catch them cheating, that s pretty clear.
2
SPEAKER_01
But the clear sign is that they will.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
So you re looking for red flags.
2
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
2
SPEAKER_01
What are those red flags that a man may cheat on you?
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, a lot of these are quite depressing, but one of them is just family history.
2
SPEAKER_01
infidelity runs in families.
2
SPEAKER_01
There is evidence that it is partially under the influence of genetics, like most behaviors, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
That shouldn t be, you know, a lot of people get up in arms about that, but genes code for proteins and regulatory molecules, and those proteins and regulatory molecules
2
SPEAKER_01
make up and run your brain, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So it s not surprising that genes have some impact on behavior, and it seems that it has some impact on a person s individual likelihood of pursuing infidelity, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
So I m not saying that you should be punitive about this, but in terms of just red flags, it s like, and plenty of people whose dads cheat don t cheat themselves, but it s like if you know a guy s dad cheated, it s like, well, he s more likely to himself, probably.
2
SPEAKER_01
More likely than someone whose dad was, you know, the epitome of faithfulness.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I don t think that that s, you know, that s going to be partially social, it s going to be partially biological.
2
SPEAKER_01
And a lot of people take that as a very controversial thing to say, but the data supports it.
2
SPEAKER_00
Another risk- So it s really like, okay, if you ve found out that their father cheated, ask them questions about what they think about that.
2
SPEAKER_00
Ask them questions about- It s just a risk factor.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s a risk factor.
2
SPEAKER_01
It doesn t mean it s going to happen.
2
SPEAKER_01
It doesn t mean it s going to happen.
2
SPEAKER_01
In the same way that you might if you found out that
2
SPEAKER_01
that a person s father had schizophrenia, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
They suffered from schizophrenia.
2
SPEAKER_01
You wouldn t say, oh, they re definitely going to be schizophrenic.
2
SPEAKER_01
Sure.
2
SPEAKER_01
You would just say, OK, all else being equal, if I know nothing else about two people, and one of them has a family history and one of them doesn t.
2
SPEAKER_01
Watch out for this, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that s that.
2
SPEAKER_01
Maybe the rest.
2
SPEAKER_00
All right, so family history is the first red flag.
2
SPEAKER_00
Second one?
2
SPEAKER_01
Past, frankly, just
2
SPEAKER_01
What are their actual sexual inclinations?
2
SPEAKER_01
So we see there s this concept in psychology known as sociosexuality, which is essentially a person s propensity to engage in uncommitted mating.
2
SPEAKER_01
And if someone really enjoys sleeping with people who they just met and loves to have one night stands and things like that and doesn t want to or need to be in love in order to have a passionate sexual relationship with somebody,
2
SPEAKER_01
those sorts of people who really love that sort of stuff are going to be more inclined towards unfaithfulness than people who don t.
2
SPEAKER_01
And you might think, oh, that s kind of peculiar, but it s really not when you think about the fact that most infidelity is, to some degree, uncommitted mating.
2
SPEAKER_01
And so you re asking like, hey, do you like other forms of uncommitted mating?
2
SPEAKER_01
And if they do, I d say that they re more likely.
2
SPEAKER_01
And both of these factors that I ve mentioned, we re talking about men, but both of these apply to- For women as well.
2
SPEAKER_01
To women as well.
2
SPEAKER_01
There s red flags for women that they might cheat.
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, just in the sense that if you ve, if, yeah, if you re dating two people, men or women, right.
2
SPEAKER_01
And I really want to emphasize that because a lot of people make this point, but they only talk about women.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it s, it s clear that they re just trying to score points in some weird gender war that I don t relate to at all.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s just embarrassing to me to watch it, but it is true that, you know, if you re someone who is sociosexually unrestricted, let s say.
2
SPEAKER_01
you re probably more interested in sleeping with people other than your wife, husband, girlfriend, boyfriend.
2
SPEAKER_00
And I guess that goes into like the whole body count issue.
2
SPEAKER_00
Like people talking about body count and how does that play into if someone has a higher
2
SPEAKER_00
rate of sexual intimacy with people that are not committed to their body count, whether they re committed or not committed, are they more likely to cheat if they re with me?
2
SPEAKER_00
It s like a... Well, yeah.
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, let s talk about it in the most nuanced way possible, because it probably is a proxy based on the information that I m aware of, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
There is some data on this.
2
SPEAKER_01
Some people have run these studies, and I would say that there probably is an association there.
2
SPEAKER_01
I actually think that it would be overly cautious to say there s not an association there.
2
SPEAKER_01
But think about the context, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
If you meet one guy and he s 19 and has slept with 10 strangers in his first semester at college versus you meet a 30-year-old man who has had a few one-night stands and several relationships that didn t work out.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like that s still a body count of 10, but those are very different people.
2
SPEAKER_01
Like if you re asking me, I wouldn t say that there s any particular reason to be worried that that man is going to have an affair, right?
2
SPEAKER_01
But if the 19 year old, I m like, this guy s kind of out of control.
2
SPEAKER_01
So it s really, I would say that body count and maybe I m wrong about this, but
2
SPEAKER_01
I would suspect that body count predicts infidelity in as much as body count correlates with sociosexuality, if I had to guess.
2
SPEAKER_00
And why is it so looked down upon when women, younger women, sleep with a lot of men versus younger men sleeping with a lot of women?
2
SPEAKER_00
It s an interesting question.
2
SPEAKER_00
Is there any science or research that shows how it can harm one of the other genders more or less?
2
SPEAKER_01
Well, I ll talk about that because a lot of guys say, oh, and this is just wishful thinking.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s kind of a little bit of coping and seething.
2
SPEAKER_01
It s people saying like, oh, men can do whatever they want sexually and it doesn t mean anything, but women have to be chaste and pure.
2
SPEAKER_01
And it s like,
2
SPEAKER_01
Almost every study that I m aware of that shows a negative association between promiscuity and relationship outcomes shows the same results in men, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying that there s no studies that show one gender or the other, but in general, if you look at a set of married people and try to find like, oh, does body count predict marital satisfaction or- Divorce rates.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, or infidelity, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
Generally, it s like, oh, the effect is found in women and men.
3
SPEAKER_01
Why is it more stigmatized in women versus men in the American West?
3
SPEAKER_01
You know, in America and in the West more generally, I d say, kind of an interesting question.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then there are other cultures where it s also stigmatized more on one gender versus the other.
3
SPEAKER_01
And generally it is, the stigma does lean towards women.
3
SPEAKER_01
And it s a complicated question.
3
SPEAKER_01
I don t think I m the right person to answer it because I don t know, but I will note that it s not because it only matters as an indicator for one gender.
3
SPEAKER_01
That s just not true.
3
SPEAKER_01
Gotcha.
3
SPEAKER_01
Okay.
3
SPEAKER_01
It could also, to be frank, it could also be that in these societies, because just as a note, a lot of people think that only men care about this stuff, but when you do surveys and you ask questions like, what s the ideal body count?
3
SPEAKER_01
So I think Steve Stewart Williams did a study on this.
3
SPEAKER_01
and you find that both men and women care about it, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
They both care, right, to an extent.
3
SPEAKER_01
What is the ideal body count?
3
SPEAKER_01
It s a moderate number, generally.
3
SPEAKER_01
Not zero.
3
SPEAKER_01
There s this kind of... And this is in Western samples, but in their studies, and also I think Alexander from Date Psychology tried to validate this with his Twitter followers.
3
SPEAKER_01
But the Stuart Williams study, I believe it was UK and US.
3
SPEAKER_01
It might just be UK, I m not sure.
3
SPEAKER_01
But similar results all around, about
3
SPEAKER_01
average right so somewhere in the realm of what s average or somewhere between a few and several is generally what we see in three to seven yeah a few to several sure a few to seven yeah so it s under 10 people seem to be more than one yeah people seem to discriminate against and i m not saying you know obviously there are some people who you know fetishize virginity and are very attracted to it but
3
SPEAKER_01
In general, it seems that men and women are a bit put off by inexperience and really put off by too much experience.
3
SPEAKER_01
So it s like if you, and women discriminate more harshly against inexperience than men, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
And they both discriminate quite harshly against too much experience.
3
SPEAKER_01
So the graph, if I were to graph like, and by the way, I don t think that anyone should be counting the number of people they sleep with so that way they hit the optimal number, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
This might help people lie more effectively about how many people they ve slept with, but if you were to graph, you know, optimal body count, right, in terms of the average person s interests, it would look something like a wave, right, where it s like it starts off like not a huge She ll Be A Virgin, but not ideal.
3
SPEAKER_01
And then it s like, oh, a few.
3
SPEAKER_01
Now we re talking about a normal, healthy, functioning adult.
3
SPEAKER_01
Someone who s not a loser, but someone who is.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and someone who has sex.
3
SPEAKER_01
Right, right.
3
SPEAKER_01
Just my type, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
Exactly.
3
SPEAKER_01
I think that s what people are thinking.
3
SPEAKER_01
They don t want someone who s a complete prude.
3
SPEAKER_01
They want someone who has a full sex drive.
3
SPEAKER_01
Some knowledge.
3
SPEAKER_01
Some knowledge, right.
3
SPEAKER_01
But then after you get past several, then it s a wave crashing on the shore.
3
SPEAKER_01
It really does.
3
SPEAKER_01
People are put off by it.
3
SPEAKER_01
So to say that women care too, I guess it would be interesting.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s like, well, in most of these cultures where women s sexuality is more strictly controlled than men s and more harshly stigmatized are cultures where men have all the power, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
And so maybe if women had all the power, they would start becoming very sexually controlling and neurotic about male sexuality.
3
SPEAKER_01
Interesting.
3
SPEAKER_01
I m not sure that they would, I m not convinced that they would, but we can t run the experiment.
3
SPEAKER_01
There s no way of testing that in a lab that I know of.
3
SPEAKER_01
I mean, maybe some clever researcher is listening and thinking, oh, I ve got an idea.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s clear that women care too, and seemingly to a similar degree, similar-ish anyway.
3
SPEAKER_01
And so it s possible that the reason that we see the stigma is just about who has the power.
3
SPEAKER_01
But again, I m going to be cautious here and say that there are probably experts on chastity and purity in these concepts who have very fleshed out ideas as to why it s men who are doing this kind of stigmatizing.
3
SPEAKER_01
But that would be based on my knowledge.
3
SPEAKER_01
That would be my hypothesis.
3
SPEAKER_00
What s your thoughts on jealousy?
3
SPEAKER_00
Do you feel like jealousy and insecurity is a sign that someone loves you or is it a toxic, unhealthy trait?
3
SPEAKER_01
A lot of people do, and this isn t, you know, laboratory studies.
3
SPEAKER_01
This is just living a human life.
3
SPEAKER_01
A lot of people do seem to find some degree of jealousy sexy, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
But jealousy is also, just because it s like, oh, this person really cares about me.
3
SPEAKER_01
They really care what I m doing.
3
SPEAKER_01
But do they really care about you or are they more insecure about themselves?
3
SPEAKER_01
My feelings on jealousy is that it s a naturally evolved human emotion.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s one of the many pieces of evidence that we are a, let s say, a serially monogamous ape.
3
SPEAKER_01
And I m not alone in thinking that, by the way.
3
SPEAKER_01
Helen Fisher wrote a very good book on this, and there are plenty of academics who agree with me.
3
SPEAKER_01
I also know that there are plenty of academics who disagree and think, I saw you had sex at dawn in the lobby.
3
SPEAKER_01
So there are plenty of people who disagree with this, but humans have a evolved psychological adaptation to feel jealous when they see threats to their partner s fidelity, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
So it s like if you see a super hot guy talking to your fiancee, that might be like-
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, you re like, this isn t... I mean, you seem like a totally secure guy, but you might be sitting there thinking, this isn t ideal, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
Right, right.
3
SPEAKER_01
And same for her.
3
SPEAKER_01
You go to an event and a bunch of girls want your autograph or whatever.
3
SPEAKER_01
She might be... And she seems like a very secure person as well, but she might be internally be like, this is not the ideal situation.
3
SPEAKER_01
And that is a evolved psychological adaptation to, in your case, protect paternity, and in her case, protect investment.
3
SPEAKER_01
So if a lot of people don t understand ... The evolutionary psychology of men s jealousy is very clear.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s a clear story.
3
SPEAKER_01
If someone else is sleeping with your girlfriend, you might end up raising a kid that s not yours, right?
3
SPEAKER_01
So that s a pretty clear narrative.
3
SPEAKER_01
Everyone understands that.
3
SPEAKER_00
So you want to protect that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
3
SPEAKER_01
It s like, oh, I don t want that to happen.
3
SPEAKER_01
So jealousy is natural.
3
SPEAKER_01
On the woman s side, there s no chance that her, in most cases, there is no chance that he is going to be pregnant.
3
SPEAKER_01
So she s not too worried about that.
3
SPEAKER_01
But what she is worried about is that if you re out sleeping with other women, maybe you end up raising those kids, taking care of her, taking care of those kids, and then she s left alone with a baby and nobody around.
3
SPEAKER_01
Interesting.
3
SPEAKER_01
So both sexes have strong reasons to feel jealous, and those have deep roots in our evolutionary biology.
3
SPEAKER_01
You re in a relationship, do you feel jealous ever?
3
SPEAKER_01
Yes.
3
SPEAKER_01
But I also, I will say this, that the research really helps.
3
SPEAKER_01
Because it s like, no genuinely, because I m like.
3
SPEAKER_00
Here s the thing, I m going to give you, I mean, you re what, 26, 27?
3
SPEAKER_00
I m 40, almost 41.
3
SPEAKER_00
I would say every relationship I was in from 16 to 35, I was jealous.
3
SPEAKER_00
So I m going to grow out of it.
3
SPEAKER_00
At different levels.
3
SPEAKER_00
I m not saying you re going to grow out of it.
3
SPEAKER_00
It was one of the hardest things for me to actually overcome.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now I m just going to speak from personal experience.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if this backs any data or research or science that you ve seen, but what I do know is being jealous was a horrible thing to feel.
3
SPEAKER_00
It never felt good for me.
3
SPEAKER_00
I never felt empowered and excited by it.
3
SPEAKER_00
It caused more stress and anxiety, and it probably had me saying things that I shouldn t have said in my relationships, acting in certain ways I shouldn t have acted, and nothing horrible, but nothing benefiting me.
3
SPEAKER_00
There was no benefit ever
3
SPEAKER_00
in the relationship for me being jealous.
3
SPEAKER_00
Now, you might be able to say, well, you know, having a little bit of jealousy and saying, oh, who is that guy and showing that you care that they were talking to someone else.
3
SPEAKER_00
Maybe there s some slight benefit for that.
3
SPEAKER_00
But just like you said, like, you know, someone in a boxing match who s like outmatched and know they re going to lose.
3
SPEAKER_00
that builds and you start throwing haymakers later, that is not a fun picture in a relationship.
3
SPEAKER_00
Sometimes hard to get back.
3
SPEAKER_01
And also it doesn t, everyone is, and I m not a terribly jealous person, I m just acknowledging that I have that emotion.
3
SPEAKER_00
You have jealousy.
3
SPEAKER_00
I have that emotion.
3
SPEAKER_00
Of course.
3
SPEAKER_01
Like everybody.
3
SPEAKER_01
I get it.
3
SPEAKER_00
To an extent.
3
SPEAKER_01
I certainly don t have morbid jealousy or anything like that, but the green-eyed monster sometimes visits.
3
SPEAKER_01
Of course.
3
SPEAKER_01
But what I will say is that ... Let me finish my thought, then you add to that.
3
SPEAKER_00
Please, actually, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
Then you add to that.
3
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
3
SPEAKER_00
So the jealousy that I felt never added any benefit to the relationship, and it only made me feeling more insecure and anxious.
3
SPEAKER_00
There was a time when I was about 34, 35, 36, in that time where I noticed the jealousy started to leave my body.
3
SPEAKER_00
Like, I stopped being jealous if this person was going to be with someone else.
3
SPEAKER_00
There was something that flipped inside of me.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I was in another relationship after that where I had zero jealousy.
3
SPEAKER_00
that I can think of.
3
SPEAKER_00
Maybe there was moments, but it didn t come out as like jealous acts.
3
SPEAKER_00
And I remember thinking to myself, something switched inside of me.
3
SPEAKER_00
I don t know if it was the time, the season of life, the experiences of different relationships I d been in, the agony and pain that I felt by having jealousy in 20 years of my life before that, but something flipped
4
SPEAKER_01
But then I just said, if this person doesn t want to be with me, what s the point of me being jealous or insecure if they re going to move on and leave?
4
SPEAKER_01
It s probably going to be painful in the moment, but it s going to benefit me in the long term.
4
SPEAKER_01
So I just got to a point in my relationship with Martha now, when I started dating her, she s a very famous celebrity in her country and done 40 movies.
4
SPEAKER_00
Her DM requests are really horrifying.
4
SPEAKER_01
Oh yeah, I mean, I don t look at that stuff.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m kidding.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m sure she s got tons of men who have lots of money, who are sexy, charming, who have big businesses, who are celebrities.
4
SPEAKER_01
that were reaching out to her before me, and I m sure some still reach out now, right?
4
SPEAKER_01
She doesn t engage in that.
4
SPEAKER_01
But if she didn t want to be with me, it would be the greatest gift that she would give me by moving on quicker than staying with me longer and then cheating on me or ending it later.
4
SPEAKER_01
And so I m like, if you want to be with me,
4
SPEAKER_01
It s because you re committed to the vision of our relationship and what we can build together.
4
SPEAKER_01
Now, that doesn t mean I just get to be a sloppy human being and stop caring about her and stop investing in time and communicating and loving her and speaking life and abundance into her.
4
SPEAKER_01
So I m constantly developing self as a man and as a human being to build confidence, to be my word to myself, to add value to society, to be desirable to myself, but also to her.
4
SPEAKER_01
And if that s not enough for her, then we shouldn t be together.
4
SPEAKER_01
And so the jealousy thing just doesn t add value to the relationship from my experience.
4
SPEAKER_01
I completely agree.
4
SPEAKER_01
I think that s all very wise.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying you should just like cut it off right now.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I know.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I don t, this isn t something that I struggle with.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, that s good.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s not a huge part of my life, but I was just admitting that I have something.
4
SPEAKER_00
But you acknowledge you have something.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yes, yes.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s fine, like many people do.
4
SPEAKER_00
Do you engage in any of the playful jealousy that we discussed?
4
SPEAKER_00
The kind of, hey, who was that guy?
4
SPEAKER_00
No.
4
SPEAKER_00
None of that?
4
SPEAKER_00
None of the jokes?
4
SPEAKER_00
No.
4
SPEAKER_00
Interesting.
4
SPEAKER_01
I m trying to, I mean, maybe there was once or twice where I was like, you know, where do you know that guy from?
4
SPEAKER_01
Where like, like someone came up to her like, just curious, like, oh, is this someone you dated in the past or someone who was hitting on you before?
4
SPEAKER_01
Just more of like, who is this person?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
But not from a sense of like, why are you talking to this guy?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
Oh, no, no, no.
4
SPEAKER_00
Never.
4
SPEAKER_00
Never me either.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
4
SPEAKER_00
No, no, no.
4
SPEAKER_00
That s not my personality.
4
SPEAKER_01
But no, I don t.
4
SPEAKER_01
I don t know why.
4
SPEAKER_01
I don t.
4
SPEAKER_01
I think, again, I had too much pain and suffering by experiencing.
4
SPEAKER_01
No, I probably had a lot more jealousy than you.
4
SPEAKER_00
I wasn t as evolved as you.
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, it sounds like you really suffered from it.
4
SPEAKER_00
I ve been quite lucky.
4
SPEAKER_00
I ve also heard, I don t know, I mean, I think that a little bit of playful protectiveness, if it s in that spirit, I think that, again, some people find it quite sexy and quite stimulating, that it s like, oh, wow, this
4
SPEAKER_00
I get that.
4
SPEAKER_00
This woman wants me so badly, this guy wants me so badly, they don t want anyone else to talk to me.
4
SPEAKER_00
I get that.
4
SPEAKER_00
But where does that go to?
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, but that s with the very strict provision that it s like, it doesn t lead to
4
SPEAKER_00
controlling and stringing papers, such as going through DM requests, such as going through... Give me access to everything, where are you every two hours, all that stuff.
4
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah, why didn t you call me last night, et cetera.
4
SPEAKER_01
And I think that s, you know, it s a slippery slope.
4
SPEAKER_01
For sure.
4
SPEAKER_01
It s like, okay, I m going to drink a glass of wine once a week, and then I start having twice a week, and then two glasses of wine a night, and then it s like, now I m an alcoholic.
4
SPEAKER_01
So it s okay, make sure you manage that, I think, is the thing.
4
SPEAKER_01
Otherwise, I just think that s a lot of relationships struggle with too much jealousy.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
4
SPEAKER_01
From my personal experience.
4
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, for sure.
4
SPEAKER_01
I don t have the science behind it, but I m curious, when you know when you ve been dating someone that they are actually in love with you, are there clear signs that someone truly loves you?
4
SPEAKER_00
Such a good question.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I spoke to the world s leading expert, and I ll flag here as well that I m a very
4
SPEAKER_00
let s call it the earliest career researcher possible.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m a PhD student.
4
SPEAKER_00
Everything that I ve said in this conversation, I ve done some research myself, we ve run a couple studies, and one of them s in the write-up phase, one of them s under peer review.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m active as a peer reviewer.
4
SPEAKER_00
I speak at academic conferences, et cetera, but I m still very, you know, even though I m an active researcher, I m still very early.
4
SPEAKER_00
So everything that I ve said so far, it s the work of other people, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And that s part of kind of my mission, let s say, as a person, is like, I love my field, I love the researchers in my field, and I want all of their voices to be heard on platforms like this.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I spoke to Helen Fisher, who is someone who definitely doesn t need my implication.
4
SPEAKER_00
She s very famous.
4
SPEAKER_00
But she s...
4
SPEAKER_00
I would say the world leading expert in romantic love understands it top to bottom, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And what she told me is that the best proxy that we have, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
So there s all these symptoms of romantic love, but the most, you know, if we re talking about in love, like acutely in love, the symptom that you re looking for is obsessive thinking.
4
SPEAKER_00
thinking about them all the time.
4
SPEAKER_00
Other things include, you know, special meaning, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
So their car is now better than all the other cars.
4
SPEAKER_00
Their shoes are, the way they tie their shoes is so spectacular, you d think it s adorable.
4
SPEAKER_00
Those sorts of, you know, imputing special meaning, that s pretty common with people who are in love.
4
SPEAKER_00
And love is also really best understood as, and this also comes from her work, really best understood as three brain systems, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
There s lust, which I don t think I need to explain.
4
SPEAKER_00
There s
4
SPEAKER_00
let s call it passionate love, romantic love, this acute honeymoon phase style love, which generally lasts, if things go really well, could last maybe four years, if you re lucky.
4
SPEAKER_00
If you re a long distance relationship.
4
SPEAKER_00
Maybe a little longer.
4
SPEAKER_00
And the final form is attachment.
4
SPEAKER_00
So that s when you re settled down with someone and you want that to last a long time.
4
SPEAKER_00
And there s even those feelings of stability and connection and deeper meaning.
4
SPEAKER_00
And you know, those passionate love feelings go away.
4
SPEAKER_00
And some people think, Oh, what a disaster.
4
SPEAKER_00
I want to keep them.
4
SPEAKER_00
But I mean, those passionate love feelings come with a lot of what we were just talking about, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
They come with a lot of jealousy.
4
SPEAKER_00
They come with a lot of the like, do you really want your life to be categorized by obsessing over a romantic partner for 40 years?
4
SPEAKER_00
It s like, there s more important things to be doing a few years of that.
4
SPEAKER_00
I think it s about right.
4
SPEAKER_00
Then other things.
4
SPEAKER_00
If someone, um,
4
SPEAKER_01
is in a relationship with someone right now, and they ve been cheated on by that person, but they ve chosen to stay with them, man or woman.
4
SPEAKER_01
Do you think it s possible, based on research or science that you ve studied, that that relationship can work, or that they can be faithful after infidelity?
4
SPEAKER_00
I think we all know couples who have survived infidelity, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
And there s the kind of trite aphorism, best predictor of future behaviors, past behavior.
4
SPEAKER_00
To an extent, that does seem to apply here.
4
SPEAKER_00
It s not the best predictor, but
4
SPEAKER_00
Kayla Knopp and her colleagues did a longitudinal study of people in relationships, so to say.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I believe it was Kayla Knopp.
4
SPEAKER_00
I ll have to double check that after the show.
4
SPEAKER_00
But there was a study in Endicase that looked at, okay, what s your relationship history, right?
4
SPEAKER_00
Where are you coming from here?
4
SPEAKER_00
And then watched, you know, how did this relationship play out?
4
SPEAKER_00
And excuse me if I m misquoting the stat.
4
SPEAKER_00
I read this study two years ago
4
SPEAKER_00
but I believe it was that people who had cheated in their past relationship, you know, I won t say a specific number, but it was a multiple more likely.
4
SPEAKER_00
It wasn t like they re 10% more likely.
4
SPEAKER_00
It was like they re three times more likely to cheat again than someone else taken neutrally.
4
SPEAKER_00
And that s previous relationship to current relationship.
4
SPEAKER_00
But I would say that it s like, you gain so much information.
4
SPEAKER_00
Plenty of people don t cheat.
4
SPEAKER_00
Plenty of people never cheat their entire lives.
4
SPEAKER_00
Plenty of women, plenty of men.
4
SPEAKER_00
maybe even most.
4
SPEAKER_00
And so if someone does that to you, they ve just given you, as you might say, a gift of giving you all this information about them as a person.
4
SPEAKER_00
And I m not damning cheaters.
4
SPEAKER_00
Plenty of psychologically normal good people make mistakes that they consider mistakes immediately.
4
SPEAKER_00
That happens.
4
SPEAKER_00
But this idea that it s like, there are plenty of fish in the sea and you want to choose the one fish that already did that to you,
4
SPEAKER_00
But I would say that this is, in speaking about this, I m talking a lot about, I m thinking in my mind, because of my own age, I m thinking of young relationships where hitting reset is pretty easy, and finding someone new.
4
SPEAKER_00
But if you have 10 years of relationship, and you ve got a family, and all this context, it s a little different.
4
SPEAKER_00
So I m not making any blanket recommendations.
4
SPEAKER_00
I m just saying that if someone has cheated on you, yeah, they re more likely to cheat on you than a random stranger on the street.
4
SPEAKER_00
Do you feel like Gen Z is cheating more than other generations?
4
SPEAKER_00
I don t see any evidence of that.
4
SPEAKER_00
If anything, young people are engaging in less risky sexual behaviors across the board.
4
SPEAKER_00
Really?
4
SPEAKER_00
Why is that?
4
SPEAKER_00
It s interesting.
4
SPEAKER_00
I mean, that is something where I m going to have to email you some names that you could talk to about that.
4
SPEAKER_00
Some people call it the mating crisis.
4
SPEAKER_00
What is the mating crisis?
4
SPEAKER_00
That people aren t mating as much.
4
SPEAKER_00
Why is that?
4
SPEAKER_00
Well, there s a bunch of different theories.
5
SPEAKER_01
it s not my area of expertise.
5
SPEAKER_01
I m sure you can sense that I m kind of uncomfortable speaking about it because I think it s a little bit, I m very tentative about it.
5
SPEAKER_01
I ll just say that.
5
SPEAKER_01
Like this idea that it s even a thing or that it s a bad thing.
5
SPEAKER_01
I mean, is it such a bad thing that teenagers are having less casual sex?
5
SPEAKER_01
Is that really something that, is that a problem that needs to be fixed?
5
SPEAKER_01
Is it such a problem that people are waiting longer before having sex for the first time?
5
SPEAKER_01
I don t know.
5
SPEAKER_01
I m probably dumbing it down.
5
SPEAKER_01
That s certainly not the only thing that people talk about the mating crisis.
5
SPEAKER_01
People talk about various subcultures formed around the state of not being able to mate and that sort of thing.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I appreciate that for some people, the mating market is probably especially hard now.
5
SPEAKER_01
But you wanted to ask about why it s happening.
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, one component that a lot of people who are experts in this talk about is the fact that there s a risk reduction across the board.
5
SPEAKER_01
So it s not just that they re having less casual sex, they re also drinking less, smoking less, da-da-da-da-da.
5
SPEAKER_01
Another factor that you ll hear about is that in some specific ways, and I m being very careful here because again, it s not my area of expertise, I ve heard other people who are experts,
5
SPEAKER_01
say that there s somewhat more social conservatism in some ways, using that word very carefully.
5
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying that Gen Z is super right-wing.
5
SPEAKER_01
I just mean that they are, in their social behaviors, more conservative, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
And so they might be less interested in getting super drunk on a Friday night and finding a random person at a club to get naked with, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
That s, you know, for a lot of people, that s a relatively wild thing to do, and they don t do it often if they do it at all.
5
SPEAKER_00
Have you ever been unfaithful in previous relationships?
5
SPEAKER_00
No, I haven t.
5
SPEAKER_00
I guess the follow-up question would be, how do you know you could change if that had happened in the past, where you could still be a faithful person moving forward, knowing that the statistics are
5
SPEAKER_00
you know, you re more likely, how do you change behavior in someone who has?
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, one encouraging piece of advice is plenty of people in Kalanop s study, and I really hope it s Kalanop now because I ve said it twice, many people in that study who cheated in their previous relationship didn t cheat in the next one, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
So it s not doom, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
It s not that whole once a cheater, always a cheater thing.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s like, that s a good saying, and it s probably true in many cases, but it s not true in all cases.
5
SPEAKER_00
Interesting.
5
SPEAKER_01
But what you re asking, again, keep in mind that I m more of a what is guy.
5
SPEAKER_01
And so I feel like that s quite a deep spiritual question to say, how can I change and move forward?
5
SPEAKER_01
And it s one that I don t have any personal experience with.
5
SPEAKER_01
And so I haven t walked that road.
5
SPEAKER_01
And I also don t know of any data in terms of,
5
SPEAKER_01
therapeutically helping people who have that.
5
SPEAKER_01
I would say though, that it s hard to imagine therapy because it s not a pathological behavior in the sense that it s, as we spoke about at the start, animals also engage.
5
SPEAKER_01
Animals in socially monogamous species also engage in high rates of extra pair copulation, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
They also have affairs, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
So our closest socially monogamous relative, the gibbons,
5
SPEAKER_01
They re the species of ape, they have really long arms, they swing through trees, very hairy, but they look like us otherwise.
5
SPEAKER_01
They re quite close relatives of ours, all things considered.
5
SPEAKER_01
And they also engage in monogamy, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
They re very beautiful creatures.
5
SPEAKER_01
They pair up.
5
SPEAKER_01
They go into the trees.
5
SPEAKER_01
They actually sing duets.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s very romantic.
5
SPEAKER_00
Really?
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_01
And the singing seems to be kind of the Gibbon version of posting each other on Instagram for humans.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s like, we re together, just so everyone knows.
5
SPEAKER_01
But it s also about territorial defense and social signaling and whatnot.
5
SPEAKER_01
And scientists did an experiment that they really couldn t get away with in humans.
5
SPEAKER_01
where they, I believe this was Reichard, they just watched them and they were like, are they, and they counted every time they saw them have sex and they were like, or engage in intercourse or copulate.
5
SPEAKER_01
And they said, okay, how many times are they mating with their partner?
5
SPEAKER_01
How many times are they mating with someone else?
5
SPEAKER_01
Right?
5
SPEAKER_01
Someone who s not their partner.
5
SPEAKER_01
and 11% of the time they were cheating, which is much higher than humans.
5
SPEAKER_01
So treating it as, I m not saying that every behavior that occurs in other animals occurs in humans, but we see documented rates of extra pair paternity across the animal kingdom, across socially monogamous lineages.
5
SPEAKER_01
And so
5
SPEAKER_01
even though it s not necessarily a good thing to do, and so it s pathological in that sense, maybe it s morally pathological, from a psychological perspective, we all evolved to have these urges.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s just a matter of whether you choose to succumb to them.
5
SPEAKER_00
What about if someone has been cheated on in a previous relationship?
5
SPEAKER_00
What should you look out for in dating someone who has been cheated on by someone else?
5
SPEAKER_00
Well, that s a really good question.
5
SPEAKER_00
Gosh, you re really nailing these questions.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m trying to set you up for the success of the rest of the interviews you ll do with the hardest questions up front.
5
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
5
SPEAKER_00
No, I think these are excellent.
5
SPEAKER_00
Is there any research on that or how to approach a potential partner where in the first few days they say, you know what?
5
SPEAKER_00
I ve been cheated on a lot in my past, and it s a big concern of mine, and I have a lot of worries.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re not going to cheat.
5
SPEAKER_00
You re not going to do this.
5
SPEAKER_00
Or someone who s had that type of trauma, how should you approach entering a relationship with someone who s been cheated on?
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, you re already signaling.
5
SPEAKER_01
It s very perspicacious of you to notice that in your imitation, you re performing reassurance seeking, which is a behavior that s very commonly exhibited by people who have been cheated on.
5
SPEAKER_01
Right?
5
SPEAKER_01
So, you know, you go through your romance.
5
SPEAKER_01
This is like a typical kind of romantic career.
5
SPEAKER_01
Everything, you know, you re dating someone in high school, dating some people in college, da, da, da, da, da.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then you re never even thinking of the possibility that you could get cheated on.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then you, you know, see a text pop up on your partner s phone and it s like, oh my gosh.
5
SPEAKER_01
And then you find out whatever, da, da, da, da.
5
SPEAKER_01
And that s a traumatic event for many people.
5
SPEAKER_01
I mean- It s a betrayal.
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, I ll even go so far as to say traumatic just because it s certainly a betrayal, but to take it to kind of into the psychological space, PTSD is generally a term only assigned to physical threats and it s kind of unclear whether you can really categorize infidelity that way, but the symptoms of PTSD are so common, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
Such as reassurance seeking, ruminating, et cetera, are so common among people who have been cheated on.
5
SPEAKER_01
that some psychologists have coined the term and used the term PISD, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
Post-infidelity stress disorder.
5
SPEAKER_01
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_01
My advice here would be to proceed with caution and understanding and goodwill that you re dealing with someone, if you don t know what that s like, you re dealing with someone who is dealing with something quite
5
SPEAKER_01
You re quite severe.
5
SPEAKER_01
And this is another thing that I just want to know.
5
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I see, I mean, you might be mercifully tucked away from this corner of the internet, but there s a whole corner of the internet right now that s like, men cheating is fine, women cheating is not.
5
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, we ve done the research on this and women who get cheated on are often severely traumatized, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
Like about half of women who, and in some studies, more than half of women who are paired with men who are unfaithful exhibit these symptoms, right?
5
SPEAKER_01
So, to say just callously like, oh, it s different, or some nonsense about a key that opens many locks versus some stupid platitude.
5
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, what a careless thing to say about the feelings of the women that you re with.
5
SPEAKER_01
I just wonder, do these men even have mothers, the way they speak about these things?
5
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
5
SPEAKER_00
I m curious what we should be more cautious of.
5
SPEAKER_00
Getting into a relationship with someone who cheated,
5
SPEAKER_00
before or getting into a relationship with someone who s been cheated on?
5
SPEAKER_01
Well, I would be more cautious about a few more cautious about the worried about, but it depends what your concerns are.
5
SPEAKER_01
If you re worried about being with someone who s completely
5
SPEAKER_00
Like if someone s got PISD, and they can never trust the person they re with, and they re always stressed and anxious, and they re always ruminating and reassurance, and where are you?
5
SPEAKER_00
And that s not attractive after a while.
5
SPEAKER_01
No, it s a huge issue.
5
SPEAKER_00
And you re like, you might feel exhausted, and you d be like, I don t want to be with this person.
5
SPEAKER_00
They can t trust me if they re always checking where I m at, if they re always calling me saying, FaceTime me, where are you, who are you with, who is that person?
5
SPEAKER_00
That s not a sexy quality in a mating partner.
5
SPEAKER_00
And so, is that a bigger red flag?
5
SPEAKER_00
If someone who hasn t dealt with, I m not saying it s okay what they went through, but they haven t processed and started to heal that, is that more of a red flag versus someone who, in their previous relationship, cheated on their partner?
5
SPEAKER_00
You ve made such good points here.
5
SPEAKER_00
Gotta do some research on this.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, well, it s because my gut reaction was, obviously, I don t want to, I m thinking about- The cheater, be cheated on.
5
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I m like, oh, I don t want to be cheated on, so I m going to go with that.
5
SPEAKER_01
But you ve brought up a good point.
5
SPEAKER_01
I don t even know if I should share this, but I believe it was in the same study that I m referencing about once a cheater, always a cheater, that kind of thing.
5
SPEAKER_01
There s also indicative evidence, and it s just one study, so let s not go to the bank on it.
6
SPEAKER_00
You want to look for cumulative bodies of research when you re assessing a finding.
6
SPEAKER_00
But there s indicative evidence that people who have been cheated on in the past are more likely to be cheated on in their next relationship.
6
SPEAKER_00
Oh, man, that s crazy.
6
SPEAKER_00
Now, that s a disturbing finding.
6
SPEAKER_00
And you might think, well, that doesn t make any sense.
6
SPEAKER_00
How could that affect my probabilities?
6
SPEAKER_00
And I ll give you a couple examples that could be, not saying that this has been studied enough to make conclusions, but
6
SPEAKER_00
If you re the sort of person who is attracted to narcissism, let s say, plenty of people find narcissism quite sexy, but narcissism is associated with infidelity.
6
SPEAKER_00
Plenty of people find sexual narcissism sexy, so that s someone who believes that they re the best lover ever and is totally confident in bed.
6
SPEAKER_00
that also predicts infidelity, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
And so you re attracted to a trait and that makes you, that predicts your partner selection.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then the types of partners that you re attracted to, you happen to be cursed by being attracted to covariates of infidelity.
6
SPEAKER_00
You got a bad picker.
6
SPEAKER_00
You re a bad picker.
6
SPEAKER_00
Another thing would be just physical attractiveness.
6
SPEAKER_00
If you really prioritize that, people who are more physically attractive tend to have more options, tend to be more interested in suitors, et cetera, tend to be less satisfied in relationships.
6
SPEAKER_00
So if you re really interested, if you re really prioritizing like, oh, I just want to date the hottest girl possible, it s like maybe that s why you keep getting cheated on is because you re not thinking about deeper qualities.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then so not to victim blame, but it could be picking.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then I hate even saying this, but it could possibly be what you re talking about.
6
SPEAKER_00
I know of an anecdotal case
6
SPEAKER_00
where I know a woman who told me, she was like, my boyfriend was accusing me of cheating so much that I actually just did it.
6
SPEAKER_00
Like she was being falsely accused so much that it was like, I m gonna be- Might as well just do this.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, it s like, I m the bad- You re not gonna believe me either way.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m the bad guy regardless of what I do, so what s the point in being good?
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
So I m not saying that that s what causes it, but I m saying that there s a, some people hear that, they hear, oh, if I was cheated on in my last relationship, I m more likely to be cheated on in my next relationship.
6
SPEAKER_00
And they just think, what the heck, that couldn t be true.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s like, well, there s actually several ways that it could be true.
6
SPEAKER_00
And we just talk about it.
6
SPEAKER_00
Wow.
6
SPEAKER_01
Gosh, this is so fascinating.
6
SPEAKER_01
You know, I really think about,
6
SPEAKER_01
When we choose out of a wound, you know, you re talking about you re attracted to narcissism.
6
SPEAKER_01
Maybe there was something your parent, one of your parents had this trait and it was attractive to you or just maybe it was unattractive, but you re trying to fix that parent or whatever it might be.
6
SPEAKER_01
But when we are attracted based on a wound, a psychological wound,
6
SPEAKER_01
it typically ends up having more challenges and problems we need to overcome in that relationship, because we re trying to fix someone.
6
SPEAKER_01
We re trying to, we re attracted to them, and then we want to change them, as opposed to being attracted and saying, I accept you for who you are.
6
SPEAKER_01
Obviously, we re going to grow and evolve, but I accept the personality, the values, the qualities that you have.
6
SPEAKER_01
And I think if we haven t healed something within us, we re going to keep attracting that thing that chemically, sexually stimulates us and makes us feel something.
6
SPEAKER_01
But then we re going to also be afraid of it, or we re going to be needing reassurance on something.
6
SPEAKER_01
So we re attracted, but you re not going to hurt me, are you?
6
SPEAKER_01
As opposed to, oh, I see you for the whole person that you are.
6
SPEAKER_01
I ve asked all the questions.
6
SPEAKER_01
I m allowing my gut to also have intuition and be like, is he being honest?
6
SPEAKER_01
And is she following through on what she s saying?
6
SPEAKER_01
And is there congruency?
6
SPEAKER_01
Then you re able to choose based on the whole person versus, oh, I m just getting this chemical feeling by what I see or what I m attracted to.
6
SPEAKER_01
What s your thoughts on that?
6
SPEAKER_00
I think you put it quite well, and I don t have much to add.
6
SPEAKER_00
I would also note that with my specific example,
6
SPEAKER_00
Narcissism is interesting because there are very good reasons to be.
6
SPEAKER_00
So narcissism pretty consistently has a small effect predicting attractiveness in general.
6
SPEAKER_00
Really?
6
SPEAKER_00
What do you mean by that?
6
SPEAKER_00
Meaning that if someone s super cocky versus someone who s average cockiness or insecure, right, the cocky person generally has a slight competitive advantage in like a speed dating setting.
6
SPEAKER_00
More options.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think it s more track.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
So, and you can talk about why that is.
6
SPEAKER_00
And one of it is just that who doesn t want to be around someone confident, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
And also it gives you this veneer of
6
SPEAKER_00
being able to take care of yourself and others.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think that some people, I think that to be honest, it s like, I m not saying that I prefer that, I don t, but I do understand that a trait that is in some ways negative, narcissism, in many ways negative actually, I ll be frank,
6
SPEAKER_00
In certain environments, and maybe such as a speed dating study, you sit down with someone and they sit down at the table, they re full of confidence, they re relaxed, they want to chat with you, they want to flirt with you, and they re, you know, taking all your compliments in their stride.
6
SPEAKER_00
That s a lot of fun to be around.
6
SPEAKER_00
And so it might not be that that person is wounded and choosing, you know, sexual narcissists, let s say.
6
SPEAKER_00
They haven t spent enough time with them yet.
6
SPEAKER_01
Spend time with someone, get to know them.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
6
SPEAKER_00
And maybe, yeah, I would say that my, so you, so this podcast is very big on, you know, helping people add value to their lives and improve.
6
SPEAKER_00
And, and I m not really much of an advice person, but I will say one piece of advice that if you find yourself getting cheated on over and over and over again, right.
6
SPEAKER_00
If you re, if you re listening to this.
6
SPEAKER_00
It would be worth taking a step back and saying, look, it s not my fault that this happened, but what can I change about my future behavior to avoid this happening again?
6
SPEAKER_00
And I think one set to look at changing would be in picking.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like, okay, well, I keep getting cheated on.
6
SPEAKER_00
Who am I dating?
6
SPEAKER_00
Well, I m only dating hot narcissists, let s say.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m only dating sociosexually unrestricted party animals.
6
SPEAKER_00
Maybe I can pick someone more settled down, more reliable, and maybe they don t have that same sexy cockiness and party atmosphere, but maybe they re going to be more reliable.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then on the other end, the other set of things, so that s choosing.
6
SPEAKER_00
And then maybe there s also, I mean, humans naturally perform a suite of mate retention behaviors, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
it could partially be a skill issue.
6
SPEAKER_00
It s like you re creating an atmosphere that pushes people away in your relationships.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s like, how can I create an atmosphere that, very much like you were saying earlier about your personal journey with jealousy, we re creating an atmosphere where people want to stay, as opposed to creating a cage that they feel trapped in.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, exactly.
6
SPEAKER_01
From all the research that you ve done, again, you re early in your career, but you ve done a lot of research and studies, and you ve dived into the research from a lot of other people.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, that s accurate.
6
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, I mean, I ve done, again, I ve done two studies.
6
SPEAKER_00
I m known not for, like if I, I was telling you before, it s like if I go to an academic conference, nobody s coming up to me trying to talk to me about, you know, like, oh, I really liked that study.
6
SPEAKER_00
They want to talk about TikTok.
6
SPEAKER_00
Sure, sure, sure.
6
SPEAKER_01
But all the research that you ve done and studied other people s work.
6
SPEAKER_01
Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.
6
SPEAKER_01
Years and years of reading, yeah.
6
SPEAKER_01
What is the research that stands out to you the most around love, relationships, and intimacy in a modern world?
6
SPEAKER_01
And what is the research where you know data proves something that you still need work on personally?
6
SPEAKER_00
And you know what, I actually think I can do a blended answer here.
6
SPEAKER_00
So this is partially coming from Helen Fisher, right, who we mentioned earlier.
6
SPEAKER_00
It would be nice to give her a shout out, but also, you know, other disciplines.
6
SPEAKER_00
The research on what we know impacts
6
SPEAKER_00
success in romantic relationships, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
So there are very simple things that you can do to improve, you know, your romantic connection with someone, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
Some obvious ones are, you know, have more sex, say nice things to them, flirt with them, but also touch them in non-escalative ways.
6
SPEAKER_00
Let s say cuddling is very good for you, you know, being more, you know, physically generous in the sense that, you know, maybe you re in the kitchen with them, giving them, you know, giving them a kiss on the back of the neck or something like that.
6
SPEAKER_00
Those things seem to really improve everyone s satisfaction, both yours and theirs, being very romantically generous, even with someone who you ve been with for a long time.
6
SPEAKER_00
And it s interesting how effective it is from a subjective perspective.
6
SPEAKER_00
If you ve been in a long relationship, just be like, oh, I can kind of, I can force it a little bit.
6
SPEAKER_00
I can be like, I m going to give this person a compliment just for no reason right now.
6
SPEAKER_00
And watch how it changes your relationship.
6
SPEAKER_00
You feel better, they feel better.
6
SPEAKER_00
And that s, you know, that s a, you met Tim obviously, that s part of what we re doing at Copley, right?
6
SPEAKER_00
Really trying to, so couply is our app that we have where you and your partner both download it.
6
SPEAKER_00
And what we re trying to do is to integrate some of the science of what makes a successful relationship into that.
6
SPEAKER_00
So that the advice that we re giving, right.
6
SPEAKER_00
And the, and the activities that we re providing are ones that can actively lead to good outcomes between couples.
6
SPEAKER_00
Now, in terms of things that I need to work on, right.
6
SPEAKER_00
I think, I mean, that s quite a personal question, but I ll say that I ve underestimated the importance of physical attraction.
7
SPEAKER_01
to romantic love, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
If you re in a relationship, you cannot just take your foot off the gas and start looking like a slob and hope that they ll stick around for your personality.
7
SPEAKER_01
That might be the world that we want to be in, but a huge component of
7
SPEAKER_01
being in a relationship and showing up for them is doing that, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And... It s taking care of yourself.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, it s taking care of yourself, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And really not just at a spiritual level, but also at a physical level.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s like we see that people in relationships tend to invest less in their physical appearance, but investing in your physical appearance is... How important is being physically attractive in a long-term relationship?
7
SPEAKER_01
Well, in short-term relationships, very important.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s the most important thing, probably.
7
SPEAKER_01
To attracting the person.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
So in speed dating study, you know, we all in our surveys and questionnaires, we say, oh, I want someone who s honest, generous, loyal, kind, et cetera.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
Smart.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, smart, yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
We talked about that before the show a little bit.
7
SPEAKER_01
But in behavioral studies, depending on the study, physical attractiveness comes out as really important.
7
SPEAKER_01
As the number one factor?
7
SPEAKER_01
In a speed dating paradigm,
7
SPEAKER_01
Right.
7
SPEAKER_01
So speed dating paradigm, you get people in the real world to meet 60 seconds with a person.
7
SPEAKER_00
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_00
You re going to be like, am I physically attracted to this person or not?
7
SPEAKER_01
But it s also kind of funny because we see it in vignette studies as well.
7
SPEAKER_01
And physical attractiveness seems to have an effect on people s perception of your personality.
7
SPEAKER_01
That s a very well established psychological finding.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
Some people call it the halo effect, which is more extrapolable.
7
SPEAKER_01
And it s not exactly what we re talking about here, but it s related, which is this idea that
7
SPEAKER_01
If you re, you know, if you, if you, and this is kind of a caricature of it, but it is, but it is broadly true that it s like, okay, well, which of these photos is sexiest to you?
7
SPEAKER_01
And it s like this guy or this girl.
7
SPEAKER_01
And then it s like, now, which of these biographies paired with the photos has the best personality?
7
SPEAKER_01
It s like also this guy.
7
SPEAKER_01
So, so then there s also things where attractive people are perceived to be more intelligent, even though they re probably not.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, attractive people are perceived to be funnier, even though they re probably not.
7
SPEAKER_01
Attractive people, they get all these career benefits, but the main benefit seems to be in mating.
7
SPEAKER_01
I mean, being attractive isn t just about attracting mates, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And we can talk about that more.
7
SPEAKER_01
But in attracting mates, it is a tremendous advantage.
7
SPEAKER_01
Attractive people have more mates, more desirable mates, more committed and doting mates.
7
SPEAKER_01
The only way that I m aware of that you can plug in attractiveness and see, oh, this is actually a disadvantage is that more physically attractive people tend to be less satisfied in their romantic relationships.
7
SPEAKER_01
Why is that?
7
SPEAKER_01
Well, I mean, it depends on the study.
7
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying that that s a consistent result, that it s like this gets found every time, but there is some indicative evidence that more physically attractive people are less satisfied.
7
SPEAKER_01
And that if you manipulate their perception of their own attractiveness, you make them think that they re hot, then they are like more interested in other people and that kind of thing.
7
SPEAKER_01
Wow, because they keep looking for the greater option.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s harder to be happy with your choice of meal when everything s on the menu, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And if you re super hot,
7
SPEAKER_01
you ve got more choices, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
That would be, that s what other people have said about this, is it s like, it s kind of hard to settle down when it s like people are constantly interested in you, that sort of thing.
7
SPEAKER_01
But again, it could be that this, I mean, again, this isn t like a, this isn t what we call, what we might call, I mean, no one in academia ever uses this phrase, but like settled science, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
It could be that more studies are done.
7
SPEAKER_01
And for anything that I ve said in this podcast, it could be the case that future studies are done and this turns out not to replicate or it doesn t seem to be true.
7
SPEAKER_01
But based on the evidence that I m aware of, right, initially, it does seem to be that physically attractive people
7
SPEAKER_01
have a harder time settling.
7
SPEAKER_01
But other than that, it s just win after win after win.
7
SPEAKER_01
The people, more people will be interested in you, those people will be more interested in you, and they ll also treat you better.
7
SPEAKER_01
They ll be less likely to cheat on you, more interested in giving you gifts, all that sort of stuff.
7
SPEAKER_01
Tons of connected findings here.
7
SPEAKER_01
What s the downside of being extremely physically attractive?
7
SPEAKER_01
Well, that s one.
7
SPEAKER_01
And other than that, it just,
7
SPEAKER_01
it just seems to really help, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
It s like you get paid more, people think you re cooler, people think you have a better personality, people think you re funnier.
7
SPEAKER_01
There s a really funny study where they played, you know, they asked a bunch of people, they re like, what would you bring to a desert island, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And that s a great, if you re a funny person, that s a great opportunity to be funny, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And so they brought in a bunch of people and they said, you know, speak into the recorder, I will video you.
7
SPEAKER_01
What would you bring to a desert island?
7
SPEAKER_01
And some people, you know, they were funny, some people weren t.
7
SPEAKER_01
They showed people just the audio right and I ll be very careful here so I don t mess this up because it s kind of complex.
7
SPEAKER_01
But with just basically they did an audio only condition and a looks and audio condition so you can see who s speaking and the unattractive people.
7
SPEAKER_01
became less funny once they could be seen, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And the attractive people were more funny in the video condition.
7
SPEAKER_01
What are the pros and cons to a woman or a man dating
7
SPEAKER_00
above or below where they re currently believed they re at in the league sense.
7
SPEAKER_01
Well, the benefits of dating someone out of your league are pretty clear, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
It s like most people like to date hot, funny, intelligent, fun people who have money and are willing to spend it on you, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
And there s nothing wrong with that.
7
SPEAKER_01
And the benefits of dating someone who s hotter, funnier, richer, more intelligent, better mental health, physically healthier, the benefits to that, it s like, okay, I get it.
7
SPEAKER_01
I get why you want to do that.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I think that probably everyone listening does, but the costs are more insidious in the sense that
7
SPEAKER_01
they re not immediately apparent and they might follow you through the relationship.
7
SPEAKER_01
So that hotness, for example, might matter upfront, but to you, but maybe it doesn t matter as much to you 12 months down the line when it s like those initial kind of high lust feelings have maybe cooled down a little bit.
7
SPEAKER_01
And now it s like, you know, uh, you re, you re out at the bar and having to deal with the fact that girls are approaching and maybe that stresses you out, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
Maybe you haven t done the internal work on jealousy yet.
7
SPEAKER_01
Or maybe they ve got a wandering eye because they ve been with better and they could do better, and they re constantly getting opportunities to do better.
7
SPEAKER_01
So I would say that the benefits of dating someone above your league are quite clear to everybody, and that s why people sometimes pursue it.
7
SPEAKER_01
But the costs are that this is going to be someone who is very likely harder to keep.
7
SPEAKER_01
Because I mean, look, people who can do better generally do do better.
7
SPEAKER_01
And can you really blame them?
7
SPEAKER_01
Right.
7
SPEAKER_01
And so if you re going to go out of your way to try and date someone who can do better, that maybe isn t the most strategically prudent move.
7
SPEAKER_01
Right.
7
SPEAKER_01
it might be best to, I mean, David Buss, who is the most cited evolutionary psychologist in history, I tend to agree with him that the best situation is that you think, and I believe he said this in his book, When Men Behave Badly,
7
SPEAKER_01
is that you think, and I hope I m not misquoting them, you think that they can do better, but they can t, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
So you think that they re out of your league, but you re actually wrong about it.
7
SPEAKER_01
And they basically think the same thing about you, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
So you re in a position where it s kind of crossed misperceptions where you think, oh, they re just the greatest mate ever.
7
SPEAKER_01
They could have anybody.
7
SPEAKER_01
And they think the same thing about you and both of you are wrong.
7
SPEAKER_00
Is that a good thing or a bad thing?
7
SPEAKER_01
Well, it s a good thing in the sense that you re gonna be very grateful for them and think that they re fantastic, but you re not gonna have to deal with the costs of them going elsewhere because they actually, they re grateful for you too.
7
SPEAKER_01
So both of you thinking, oh, I ve really leveled up.
7
SPEAKER_00
That s exactly what I m trying to say.
7
SPEAKER_01
You summarized it much better than I did.
7
SPEAKER_01
Yes, is that you are looking across the bedroom, looking across the dinner table, holding their hand on a walk and thinking, gosh, I m lucky.
7
SPEAKER_01
I, yeah, exactly.
7
SPEAKER_01
Like I am just, I ve hit the lottery here and you re wrong, right?
7
SPEAKER_01
That s probably the best case scenario.
7
SPEAKER_00
As a behavior scientist on these topics, where do you struggle with allowing data and analysis and research and science that you re constantly studying versus being in the moment in a relationship with your partner?
7
SPEAKER_00
Do you have any struggles of just allowing yourself to be, feel, experience without thinking, analyzing,
7
SPEAKER_00
managing science in your mind at the same time?
7
SPEAKER_01
I mean, people have a very hard time believing this, but I really do put it, for the most part, put it all aside and just follow my heart.
7
SPEAKER_01
Really?
7
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
7
SPEAKER_01
It s like, I, yeah, I think this stuff is very interesting, and some of it is helpful.
7
SPEAKER_01
But for the most part, it s, I m a man with real emotions, and those emotions drive my behavior.
7
SPEAKER_01
And I follow them pretty consistently,
8
SPEAKER_01
I m not the sort of person who s like, oh, let me calculate based on my data what I should do here.
8
SPEAKER_01
I ve made tremendously illogical decisions because I was feeling strong romantic emotions, and I don t think there s anything wrong with that.
8
SPEAKER_00
And I ve also- You went against data.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, I would say so.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean- And it worked out.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, and I also think that that would be, I would say that this stuff is very fun to think about and some of it is really useful.
8
SPEAKER_01
But for the most part, just fall in love, have a great time, and don t sweat all this.
8
SPEAKER_01
A lot of people, they hear me talk.
8
SPEAKER_01
I get people in my comments all the time saying, you know, Mac and Murphy s the most depressing man on the internet.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I m like, you know, this is genuinely, it s like, people say very negative things from the perspective of like, I can t stop watching this, but it s making me very depressed.
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s like, here s the analogy that comes to mind, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
I, so I like explaining things, right.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I like understanding them, but it doesn t.
8
SPEAKER_01
So I, so when I m eating an apple, right.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m eating the apple and I m not thinking, oh, you know, the sensations in my mouth feel good because my primate ancestors benefited from fruit sugars in such a way that the ones who liked it reproduced more than the ones who didn t like it.
8
SPEAKER_01
That would be a crazy thing to think.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m just eating the apple and having a nice time, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Right.
8
SPEAKER_01
And in the same way, when I m, you know, having a cup of tea with my girlfriend and we re just kind of talking through the day and having a nice time,
8
SPEAKER_01
The data couldn t be further away from my heart.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s just not impacting me at all.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s cool, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s good to know that Mac and Murphy is a human being, not just a human thinking, analyzing scientist.
8
SPEAKER_01
I think that TikTok favors me coming across as a robot, which is fine, but it was just the one minute of me talking about data super fast.
8
SPEAKER_00
Right, right, right.
8
SPEAKER_00
That s great, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
I have no feelings.
8
SPEAKER_00
This has been awesome and fascinating, Mac, and I m excited for your journey, where you re at.
8
SPEAKER_00
I know you re still
8
SPEAKER_00
kind of just really getting started with your own research and your science and things like that.
8
SPEAKER_00
But the content you re putting out there, I think, is inspiring a lot of people, even though you say it s depressing more people.
8
SPEAKER_01
Well, I don t know.
8
SPEAKER_01
I don t know if it s depressing more people.
8
SPEAKER_01
I just know that there s a contingent, especially it seems.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, my audience is mostly women.
8
SPEAKER_01
And then there s this contingent of men that watch as well.
8
SPEAKER_01
And then there s this contingent of young men who are struggling on the mating market who
8
SPEAKER_01
they just see my data, and it s just more evidence that they re screwed in their minds.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I don t think that s necessarily true, but if you re an unattractive man scrolling through your feed, and my face comes up, and I m like, attractive man, I have more mates, more desirable mates, more commitment, that is depressing.
8
SPEAKER_01
I get it.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
8
SPEAKER_00
Well, you ve got this app called Coupley, which is essentially
8
SPEAKER_00
Helping couples.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s not about people that are trying to get in relations people that are already in relationship To maintain and improve their relationships.
8
SPEAKER_00
Yeah, and you re an advisor in this and you re helping kind of create some of the curriculum in there as well But this app is already out.
8
SPEAKER_00
Is that right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Oh, yeah, totally.
8
SPEAKER_01
So basically the concept of coupling right there There s all there s so many apps
8
SPEAKER_01
that try to get you into relationships, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
And this is an app that s geared towards trying to help you stay in one.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s great.
8
SPEAKER_01
You can think of the mating market like a revolving door where people are getting kind of pulled from the single pool and thrown into the dating pool constantly, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
And if you think that people being in loving romantic relationships is a good thing, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
If you actually like that,
8
SPEAKER_01
which I do, then you want more people to go in and less people to go out.
8
SPEAKER_01
And a lot of people right now are working on the in problem.
8
SPEAKER_01
So most people are in relationships, and then there s this pool of single people, depending on your data set, but it s a minority of people.
8
SPEAKER_01
There s this small group of single people, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Not small, sizable minority of single people.
8
SPEAKER_01
And there s a bunch of apps and products that are just trying to push people in ostensibly.
8
SPEAKER_01
Maybe they re not trying to do that.
8
SPEAKER_01
I won t say either way.
8
SPEAKER_01
But there are, you know, these dating apps and dating websites and and, you know, pick up artist courses and things like that, that it s like stop being single, basically.
8
SPEAKER_01
And then there s all these people here who basically have no help at all.
8
SPEAKER_01
Like, it s like there s the, there s the, you know, couples therapy if things get really bad, but for the most part, there s just not that many tools, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Certainly not on your smartphone.
8
SPEAKER_01
And so what we ve done with Coupley is we ve created an app where, which I ve, I ve, I ve just come on board as, you know, scientific advisor, part owner as well, where
8
SPEAKER_01
you and your partner download the app and you both, you know, participate in quizzes to get to know each other better, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
You take courses as well to understand how to improve your relationship, deal with things like jealousy, which we mentioned.
8
SPEAKER_01
And what I ve been brought on to do partially is just to bring the science of human mating behavior into the app so we can actually help people in a data informed way.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m not saying that it s partially experimental, but just trying to
8
SPEAKER_01
actually say, well, what is likely to really help people in relationships?
8
SPEAKER_01
So to give an example of one of my colleagues, one really important thing for couples is, one really strong predictor of relationship satisfaction is sexual satisfaction, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
So couples that, I don t think it should be a surprise to anybody, couples that are having great sex tend to be happy with each other, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
And so one thing that Tim Johnson, my CEO has done,
8
SPEAKER_01
is bring on Dr. Tara who s you know the real quote-unquote sexpert right and she s going to be helping in the app in a similar way to me just to improve people s sex lives right so bring in fun sexy quizzes and things like that and courses and classes and what we re hoping right is that this will make
8
SPEAKER_01
This will make mating better for the people who are paired, right?
8
SPEAKER_01
Because the people who are actually mated, rather than just trying to come up with a new way to swipe your thumbs and meet people.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s great, man.
8
SPEAKER_00
Coupley.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_00
They can get it anywhere on the app store or whatever if they were the...
8
SPEAKER_00
the app store on iPhone, Android, everything like that.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah, yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
And it s still a pretty large user base already.
8
SPEAKER_01
I think we re at like 400,000 users.
8
SPEAKER_01
Wow, that s great.
8
SPEAKER_01
So it s definitely established.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s awesome.
8
SPEAKER_01
But looking to take it to the next level with some science.
8
SPEAKER_01
We re playing around with AI as well.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s going to be interesting.
8
SPEAKER_00
Very cool.
8
SPEAKER_00
Copley, make sure you guys check out the app.
8
SPEAKER_00
A couple of final questions for you, Macken, but I want people to follow you.
8
SPEAKER_00
TikTok is your main spot.
8
SPEAKER_00
Mackenmurphy, I believe, is still your main place.
8
SPEAKER_00
Although you ve got a lot of different places people can follow you, but is that where you think they should go to first or Mackenmurphy.org?
8
SPEAKER_00
Where should they connect with you?
8
SPEAKER_01
I think that the safest thing to do would just be to Google my name and just kind of follow wherever you land.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, I know that, you know, I m mostly on TikTok.
8
SPEAKER_01
It s true.
8
SPEAKER_01
That s a very, you know, Gen Z space.
8
SPEAKER_01
And I m really grateful to that group of people for boosting me in this way.
8
SPEAKER_01
I mean, obviously, I m not a famous academic.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m really, it s science communication.
8
SPEAKER_01
I am a scientist, I am an active researcher, but it s really the science communication that s another, so I m grateful to that group.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
So TikTok would be fine, but if you re, I mean, you messaged me when I had like 700 followers on Instagram, I think.
8
SPEAKER_01
Yeah.
8
SPEAKER_01
Instagram is growing as well, and YouTube is tiny, and I have no idea why.
8
SPEAKER_00
I m on all of them.
8
SPEAKER_00
You re on all of them, so follow you, check you out everywhere.
8
SPEAKER_00
This is a question I ask everyone at the end of my interviews, and maybe this will change in the next five, 10 years for you, because you are so young in your life still.
8
SPEAKER_00
But this is a question I ask everyone.
8
SPEAKER_00
It s called the three truths.
8
SPEAKER_00
So I want you to imagine a hypothetical scenario.
8
SPEAKER_00
You get to live as long as you want to live.
8
SPEAKER_00
You can be 80, 100, 200, whatever, but you get to live your life exactly how you design it and envision it.
8
SPEAKER_00
And everything you want to create, it comes true, personal, professional.
8
SPEAKER_00
But for whatever reason, everything you create in your lifetime from here moving forward, it has to go with you to somewhere else.
8
SPEAKER_00
We don t have access to it in this world.
8
SPEAKER_00
This conversation, any books, podcasts, anything you ever create, we don t have access.
8
SPEAKER_00
Your research, all of it will be gone.
8
SPEAKER_00
Hypothetical.
8
SPEAKER_00
But if you could put yourself into your future self and imagine those experiences happening, living the life you want to live,
8
SPEAKER_00
And on the last day, you can only share three lessons with the world.
8
SPEAKER_00
And imagine you ve experienced this life.
8
SPEAKER_00
What would be those three truths that you would leave behind?
8
SPEAKER_01
Oh man, this is a really tough question.
8
SPEAKER_01
I m very conscious of the fact that I m young and I don t necessarily have the sort of wisdom that would... This may change, obviously, but what do you think you re at right now?
8
SPEAKER_00
And what do you think your future self will wanna share?
8
SPEAKER_01
Okay, one piece of advice that s been really
8
SPEAKER_01
helpful to me is to, at least in terms of how you behave, to try and live in accordance with your values as opposed to the vicissitudes of your base emotions and chance thoughts.