Like father, like son. Men are more likely to cheat on their wives if their fathers were unfaithful, a new study has found.
The study, carried out by a team led by Jan Havlicek of Charles University in Prague, has suggested that cheating does run in the family, at least as far as men are concerned, the Daily Mail reported.
It concluded that, while men and women both had affairs, men were more likely to stray if their fathers had been unfaithful as they were growing up. However, women were not affected in the same way by their mothers’ infidelity. Havlicek said as boys grew up by observing the world around them what was appropriate and what they could get away with. Their father was an obvious example to follow for good or for bad. For their study, the researchers recruited 86 couples. They questioned the men and women individually and in confidence about their relationships, their attitudes towards sex, their family backgrounds and their infidelities.
The study backs the idea that men’s affairs are more motivated by sex then women’s. It found that whether or not a man was satisfied and happy in his main relationship had no effect on the likelihood that he would stray.
Men usually have affairs because they want sex and a greater number of sexual partners, not because they are fed up with their wives, Havlicek said, adding women were likely to stray if they were dissatisfied with their relationship. He believes women have affairs to find a new partner. “It might be best to stay in your relationship because, in some cases, it’s better to have someone who’s not perfect than to be alone, particularly when you’ve children. Many of the women we interviewed said that’s just what they were doing,” he said.