Successful women get away with promiscuity
WOMEN who sleep around are more likely to keep their reputation intact if they earn a lot, academics have shown.
Attitudes to promiscuity appear to be heavily influenced by women’s financial independence, while people who disapprove of casual sexual relationships are more likely to know many women who are in low-paid jobs or rely on their husband to support them.
Psychologists from Brunel University, London, said the findings may reflect evolutionary instincts by which men who provide for a family need to know that the children are theirs.
The study was based on surveys of more than 5000 adults in the United States. When respondents’ views were grouped by their home state, financial dependence of women was marginally higher as a predictor of views on promiscuity than religious views.
Views on promiscuity were most liberal in states where more women are financially independent, particularly Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Illinois. It was most frowned on in southern states where more women are economically dependent on men: Texas, New Mexico, Utah, Kansas, Alabama and Virginia.
In two separate surveys, 5282 American adults were asked questions such as whether women or men should have sex with someone they had just met, and whether women or men who sleep with lots of partners were unworthy of respect or should be judged negatively.
Respondents were asked if most women they knew depended heavily on the earnings on a male partner, if they were religious and went to church often, and if their political views were liberal or conservative.
The findings, published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behaviour, showed that women, who comprised just under half of both samples, were more likely to disapprove of promiscuity than men.
Religious conviction and conservative views were the strongest predictors of disapproval of promiscuity among individuals, but knowing many women who depended on men for financial support was also a factor.
Once responses were grouped by state, however, the link between women’s financial dependence and hostility to casual sex was significantly stronger. Separate data on women’s earnings closely matched the pattern, with liberal attitudes to promiscuity strongest in states with the highest median female income, and vice versa.