“Polyamory” and the Internet

Last week we learned that polygamy, or plural marriage, exists in many societies around the world. This week we discussed how changes in technology alter the experience and expression of sexuality. Those two themes come together in a recent commentary from Wired, which suggests that polyamorous relationships are on the rise in America, in part due to social networking outlets on the Internet that offer new ways of interacting with similarly minded people. From the Wired piece:

While having multiple committed partners is not a new concept, many polyamorists have told me they felt lost, guilty, alone or freakish until they came across the word polyamory on the internet and for the first time had a context for the way they felt about love.

“You can argue that before the internet, the poly community didn’t exist,” says Franklin Veaux, author of What, Like, Two Girlfriends?, a respected polyamory FAQ. “There’s no question that the rise of the internet and the rise of polyamory coincided, although poly does predate the net by 6,000 years or so.”

Polyamory may not be a new practice, but the concept is probably new to most Americans, and relatively few research papers have been published on the subject. What do you see as the benefits and difficulties of a polyamorous lifestyle? If you could have two partners consent to such an arrangement, would you be interested? What moral or ethical issues does polyamory raise for you?

Not-so-human sexuality

Two recent stories in the news highlight some of the ways in which human morals and human behaviors are used to discuss sex behavior in the animal world.

In the first story, two western lowland gorillas in Congo were filmed having sex in the “missionary” position - that is, face to face. This is a style of sex that has not been reported before in this subspecies of gorilla, much less filmed in the wild.

Leah and George’s encounter made their plight even more poignant for Breuer.

“It leads me to think about how similar gorillas can be to humans, [and yet] we humans are destroying them,” he said.

In the second story, wildlife experts and animal rights activists are clashing over the controversial pregnancy of a juvenile endangered elephant. Wildlife experts are excited over the pregnancy, as it represents the first pregnancy of a captive elephant in Australia; activists argue that the breeding standards for captive elephants have been violated and the zoo has acted irresponsibly in allowing a juvenile to become pregnant.

Allowing such a young elephant to fall pregnant was “the equivalent of allowing your 12-year-old daughter to become pregnant,” said Erica Martin, Asia Pacific Director of the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW).

“It is completely irresponsible,” Martin said in a statement on Thursday. Martin said that under captive breeding plans elephants should be at least 11-years-old before conceiving.

Like Lauren’s earlier post on macaques and “grooming for sex,” these two stories are news, in part, because we attach human meaning to animal behaviors. Certainly, humans are animals themselves, but are we reasonable to ascribe human values to animal behaviors? Does face-to-face sex in the gorilla world suggest greater intimacy between partners, as we suggest about human lovemaking? Does the pregnancy of a juvenile in the animal world mean the same thing that it does in the human world? In what other ways do we ascribe human qualities to animal sexual behaviors, or vice versa?

How Cupid’s Arrow Works

In the wake of Valentine’s Day and our discussions about sexual attraction this week, you might want to take notice of several recent research reports.

On Tuesday, the results of two new studies were announced, just in time for Valentine’s Day. The first, soon to be published in the journal Psychological Science, suggests that attractive people are indeed attracted to other attractive people. Surprise, surprise… From the UPI story:

The study, scheduled to be published in the journal Psychological Science, found people with similar levels of physical attractiveness tend to date each other, with more attractive people being more particular about the physical attractiveness of their potential dates.

In addition, the study found people prefer to date others who are moderately more attractive than they are. The researchers also found that most people agree on what is attractive, characteristics like symmetrical faces.

However, results from a different study, soon to be published in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior, suggest that when people fall in love, they find other people to be comparably less attractive. From a Reuters story:

Feeling love for your romantic partner appears to make everybody else less attractive, and the emotion appears to work in very specific ways in enabling you to push thoughts of that tempting other out of your mind,” said Gian Gonzaga of eHarmony, whose study is published in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior.

“It’s almost like love puts blinders on people,” added Martie Haselton, an associate professor of psychology and communication studies at UCLA.

These two announcements follow on the heels of similar recent research on human sexual attraction:

All of this research might lead one to think that we really have no control over who we fall for in matters of love. In my discussion sections, many students felt that physical qualities were far less important than personality characteristics. Do you agree? If so, is personality something that can be evaluated with first impressions? Do you believe in “love at first sight”? What about “first sound” or “first smell”?

Does Flirting “Count” as Cheating?

In lecture on Wednesday, Dr. Gravlee asked a question about sexual fidelity: Are you being unfaithful if you fantasize about someone other than your partner? Your collective reaction to this question was the loudest so far this semester! Well, what about flirting?

CNN.com recently ran a story examining workplace flirtations. The story suggests that flirting on the job can be good for business, but it also describes a new term for people in platonic work “relationships”: work-spouses.

It’s hardly a unique situation. The career information Web site Vault.com reports that in a 2007 office-romance survey of 575 employees, 23 percent said they had a “work husband” or a “work wife.”

As with real spouses, work spouses turn to each other for mental and emotional support, perhaps share inside jokes or even bicker like married couples. But that’s where the line is drawn.

What does flirting accomplish and why do we do it? If you are in a relationship with someone, do you think that flirting with someone else constitutes “cheating”? What if it was your partner who was flirting with someone else? Have you ever had a workplace relationship similar to those described in the story? Would you feel comfortable with your significant other having, or referring to, their own work-spouse?

Modern love on WebMD

Heart of candyJust in time for Valentine’s Day, WebMD has launched a special report on “Modern Love: Relationships, Stress, and Your Health” (thanks, Stephanie!). The report includes articles on dating and finding love in a wired world, the science of attraction, and the health effects of stress in relationships.

Do the articles resonate with you? What lines of evidence and assumptions do the authors use to make their arguments? Check it out, and leave a comment to let us know.

Transgender debate back in the news

citysealblue.jpgThe front page of today’s Gainesville Sun reports that the local debate over a city ordinance that protects transgendered people from discrimination has attracted national attention. The Sun’s original story, which I wrote about last week, also appeared on the widely read Drudge Report.

Today’s article focuses on the “heated response” to the anti-discrimination ordinance. According to the Sun, city commissioners continue to receive complaints from opponents of the ordinance. The chief concern appears to be whether local businesses need to accommodate transgendered people in restrooms, dressing rooms, and fitness-center showers.

Joe Cirulli, founder of Gainesville Health & Fitness Centers, the city’s largest fitness provider, was among those who waited in line to address the City Commission Monday night. His comments were quick and to the point: How would this affect GH&FC, which provides showers and locker rooms for both men and women at all its centers except for its one women’s center that has facilities only for women.

Josh Alterman, owner of Alter Ego Fitness in Gainesville, shares Circulli’s apprehension. “It does concern me,” said Alterman. “I would be very uncomfortable letting a transgender customer into our female restroom, and I think that would make our female customers very uncomfortable.”

According to the Sun, the ordinance allows businesses to deny transgendered people access to restrooms and other facilities if equal alternative facilities are available.

But how big an issue is this? The Sun notes that transgender anti-discrimination laws are on the books in “93 cities and counties, 13 states and the District of Columbia.” Is there evidence that the laws have created problems in any of these places? The Sun put this question to city officials from Lake Worth and Key West, where similar provisions are in place; the officials deny that there has been any negative fallout. I wonder if there has been a systematic study of the effects of gender identity provisions in anti-discrimination laws.

The Sun also interviewed Nora Spencer, director of the University of Florida Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Affairs. As she points out, “Trans people are using bathrooms now and have been forever. People probably didn’t even realize they were in there.”

What’s your take on this debate?

Buttoned up Brits? Not so much

British flagLast week the British National Centre for Social Research released the results of its 24th annual British Social Attitudes Survey (BSA). The survey suggests that Brits are becoming more and more liberal in their attitudes about sexuality.

The most striking finding, according to British media reports, is that 70 percent of those surveyed think there’s nothing wrong with premarital sex. That’s up from just 48 percent in 1984, when the survey began. The survey also indicates that the proportion of people who subscribe to traditional gender roles has dropped almost by half over the last two decades. In 1989, 32 percent of respondents agreed that a man’s job was to earn money, while a woman’s job was to stay at home. In the latest survey, only 17 percent agreed with that opinion.

However, the latest BSA suggests that behaviors haven’t changed as much as attitudes have. For example, 77 percent of the people in couples still report that the woman usually does the laundry. That figure hasn’t changed much since 1994, according to the BSA press release (PDF).

How do these findings compare to your impression of attitudes and behavior in the United States? And where would you go to find comparable data for the U.S.?

Transgender debate in local City Hall

According to the Gainesville Sun, last night’s debate over a proposed city ordinance against gender-identity discrimination attracted a large crowd to City Hall. The ordinance would add transgered individuals as a category of people protected from discrimination.

The Sun reports that the ordinance drew both support and protest from the overflow crowd, but that most people spoke out against the proposal:

Those in favor of the ordinance lauded it as a step toward increased human rights for transgender individuals, who some said are marginalized in society. . . . Those opposed reiterated oft-cited concerns of having a man in a woman’s restroom, as well as the burden it would place on business owners to provide accommodations in the case of changing facilities.

According to the Sun, opponents of the ordinance argued that the anti-discrimination measure would constitute special treatment for a small class of people. Others, including several local pastors, objected to the ordinance on religious grounds.

Yet among the supporters were at least two UF students who spoke in favor of the proposal, according to the Sun. One commissioner also noted that several other cities and counties in the state have policies that protect transgendered individuals from discrimination.

At the moment, there’s still no word on how the City Commission voted. What’s your opinion about whether gender identity should be included in anti-discrimination policies?

Update, 4:30 p.m.: In a 4-3 vote, the Gainesville City Commission passed the ordinance to protect transgendered people from discrimination.

Science of sexuality on the newsstands

Time: Science of RomanceTomorrow’s issue of Time magazine features a series of articles on the “science of romance,” including features on why we love, why we flirt, whether online matchmaking works, and whether gay relationships are different than straight ones.

I haven’t had a chance to read all the articles yet, but on first glance, it’s striking how many of the articles take an evolutionary perspective—or at least a watered-down version of one. Indeed, the Time cover story has already attracted criticism from a blogging anthropologist, Daniel Lende, who writes about the simplistic assumptions of pop evolutionary theory.

I’ll have more to say once I’ve read the articles. In the meantime, leave a comment to let us know what you think, if you’ve read the articles.

The oldest profession: older then we thought

Last week’s film about sex and evolution raised questions about the similarities and differences between money, ape, and human sexuality. The issue has been in the news of late, too. According to news reports, a recent study suggests that male macaques pay for sex with grooming:

Selling sex is said to be humankind’s oldest profession but it may have deep evolutionary roots, according to a study into our primate cousins which found that male macaques pay for intercourse by using grooming as a currency.

Michael Gumert of Nanyang Technological University in Singapore made the discovery in a 20-month investigation into 50 long-tailed macaques in Kalimantan Tengah, Indonesia, New Scientist reports on Saturday.

On average, females had sex 1.5 times per hour.

But this rate jumped to 3.5 times per hour immediately after the female had been groomed by a male — and her partner of choice was likely to be the hunky monkey that did the grooming.

The report also suggests that the cost of obtaining sex varied with supply and demand. If females were abundant, males could woo a potential mate with just eight minutes of grooming. But if no other females were in the area, the male would have to spend twice as long grooming.

This example highlights one of the points of last week’s film—the importance of competition for mates in the evolutionary process. For more, see excerpts of the film on sexual selection in peacocks, polyandry in jacanas, and sex and social organization among chimps and bonobos.

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