ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Perhaps the grass is equally green on both sides. A new study finds that people in open relationships are actually just as happy as individuals who prefer monogamy.
Researchers at the University of Michigan surveyed 2,124 people at least 25 years old about the quality of their relationship and/or partner. About 90% of those who took part were recruited from Craigslist. The sample group was found to consist of 1,507 individuals in monogamous relationships and 617 people in consensual nonmonogamous (CNM) relationships. Fifty-one percent of CNM participants were in polyamorous relationships, 25% identified as swingers, and 25% were in open relationships.
Participants were polled on areas including “satisfaction, commitment, trust, jealousy and passionate love, which is the intense love feeling often described in new relationships,” according to a university news release.
Those in CNM relationships were found to be equally satisfied as those who enjoyed monogamy. There was also no difference found in the level of passionate love between monogamous and nonmonogamous people.
“Overall, the outcomes for monogamous and consensual nonmonogamous participants were the same—indicating no net benefit of one relationship style over another,” says Terri Conley, associate professor of psychology and women’s studies at the university, and the study’s lead author, in the news release.
Yet when it came to matters of jealousy and trust, the researchers found people in open relationships actually exhibited lower levels of jealousy and “significantly” higher levels of trust than their counterparts. This finding goes against a number of recent studies that found the average person believes monogamous relationships are more satisfying, trusting, passionate, and less jealous than other types of relationships — which led the researchers to believe a bias is held against nonmonagamous people.
According to the study, prior research shows that about 20% of Americans have been in a consensual nonmonogamous relationship at some point in their lives. As many as 5% of people in relationships identify as being swingers.
The study, Investigation of Consensually Nonmonogamous Relationships, was published this week in the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science.
There’s plenty of other evidence that cohabiting couples cheat more, experience more violence to themselves and to their children and have less sex than married couples. The idea that idiots in open relationships are as happy as married couples is really moronic. Whoever said that shouldn’t smirk when saying it.
Utter Crap!!!!! If you keep playing around on your mate you will end up finding someone you like better. Being committed to one person is where true happiness lies. I’ve done it for 30 yrs and will continue to do so.
I saw another story that said,”Study: People In Monogamous Relationships As Happy As, More Trusting Than Those Who Prefer Open Relationships” So Who is right?
As always I think it comes down to the individuals involved. Some can be happy in a traditional marriage type relationship while others would die in it and others can practice “open,” relationships and be fine. But observing the kinds of displays people exhibit these days from the very top of our society to the bottom over a host of things not just sex-I’d have to say many people find it a challenge to summon enough emotional intelligence to have a solid one on one relationship let alone an open approach to sexual relations.
There is a reason women move on from Big Macs to Whoppers, She can get the Whopper everyday instead of on occasion. *Hint*
More trusting?? if you know she’s cheating and she knows your cheating, whats to hide? “how was your day honey? “I sucked 3 guys today” oh thats nice….Upside down world
Respondents were recruited from Craigslist? Doesn’t that in itself indicate a likely non-representative sample?
Just because some college students did a research paper for a class does not mean that their methodologies or their conclusions are accurate or authoritative.
It is none of my business what others do in their own bedrooms. It is none of anyone else’s business what goes on in mine.
Has someone suggested otherwise?
You must not have read the comment section in its entirety.
Since perhaps as much as two thirds of a lot of published social science research has been proven non-replicable, I would take these findings with a big grain of salt, but from my first hand observations, threading that non-monogamy needle for the long run is iffy. Long run relationships seem to produce happier people.
More trusting my arse. THEY DON’T CARE! It’s not that they trust more, it’s that trust is no longer a factor; it’s not in the game plan. Trust is an element of a monogamous relationship. This whole article is BS.
Total and utter BS – is this article supposed to fool anyone who isn’t already stupid enough to vote Democrat?
Take the claim that there’s more trust between people who cheat on each other – what kind of idiotic claim is that? My wife lets me sleep with other women – she really trusts me. There’s nothing to trust when you’re cheating on each other – trust is only required in faithful monogamous couples.
There also isn’t more joy or love between the two – if there was sufficient joy and love between them then they wouldn’t be sleeping with other people now would they?
A population sample based upon Craig’s List? These guys must be pollsters for the DNC .
And cankles will win in a landslide!
Of course being more trusting does not necessarily equate to being more trustworthy. One could ask where trust even comes into it in an open relationship. Oh well, I just live here, and have become a stranger in a strange land. What this world does with itself, and the price they pay for doing so is on them. Goodness, they have been warned enough.
This study like all studies are flawed. They sampled couples still in an open relationship. Not the wrecks that this lifestyle causes. I have been in just about every swing club in the US and some abroad. I used to visit a particular club in NYC on a regular basis and met thousands of couples. These people are not all there. In the the end it is an open wound. There is absolutely no way to have a loving, intimated relationship under these circumstances. They should redo the study to include those that have been broken and victimized with open relationships. Many specially women are coerced by the male to participate. Many in fear of loosing their marriage or relationship if they did not. Not good.
So there were two groups. One group of Craigslist libertines and another group of swinger libertines. Since the swinger libertines were more honest about their double dipping, the swinger group were 1. just as happy and 2. not as suspicious of the double dipping because they already consented to double dipping. Notably absent is the sexual gold standard comparison group: couples who were abstinent before marriage and faithful within. This is the demographic that reports the greatest sexual and relational satisfaction. Another example of tax payer’s dollars being used to destroy social power.
STRANGE. CRAIGSLIST IS FULL OF BOTS AND SCAMS IN THE PERSONAL SECTION. SO WHERE DID THESE “REAL PEOPLE COME FROM” GO ONLINE RIGHT NOW AND SEE IF YOU CAN ACTUALLY CONFIRM 1 REAL PERSON. YOU CAN TRY FOR A WEEK AND NOT FIND ONE!
a study by cucks, for cucks.
Brought to you by AshleyMadison….Good, swing away, you’re unique, special, open-minded, and facinating people. It’s about as exciting as gay people at this point. Who cares.