middleYou may have heard that onogamy is in crisis. There are very few people who are in a relationship, let alone a relationship until they die. And even those who have already pledged seem to be finding more and more leeway. “Silent divorces” – people mentally leaving a union rather than formally dissolving it – are reportedly on the rise, as are “ethical non-monogamy” (ENM) and opening up relationships to include other partners.
This is borne out by my experience with mainstream dating apps. About 1 in 10 profiles I come across seem to express a preference for “ENM” or polyamory, or mention an existing wife or girlfriend. If you are prepared to accept those terms, the best you can hope for is that the “main partner” actually participates in the arrangement as described.
From Lily Allen’s headline-grabbing album that spills gory details about how her glamorous marriage fell apart to Haim’s Relationships, a song that expresses anxious ambivalence about the mere concept of monogamy, pop culture narratives seem equally cynical about our ability to commit to one person. It’s understandable that it’s difficult to feel optimistic about monogamy.
A survey of 1,000 Britons conducted in May last year found that almost a third (31%) believe monogamy is no longer a ‘realistic’ ideal. Among 18- to 24-year-olds, that percentage increases to 42%. A large public opinion poll conducted by YouGov in 2023 found that respondents were almost exactly split on whether or not humans are “naturally monogamous” (nearly a third were unsure).
Of course, for conservatives this is all very troubling and evidence of the erosion of good Christian values and the traditional family unit. But what if these uneasy calculations about monogamy are not about society acting against the natural order, but about bringing us closer to it?
Late last year, a study from the University of Cambridge revealed how humans’ tendency to form monogamous pairs compares with that of other mammals. This “Monogamy League Table,” which ranks 35 species by proportion of half-siblings and full siblings, places us comfortably in the top 10, but not number one.
In fact, humans ranked lower than African wild dogs, mustachioed tamarins, and Eurasian beavers, and had a higher “percentage of monogamy” than white-handed gibbons and meerkats. At the bottom of the species studied was the Scottish Soay sheep, reflecting each ewe being mated to several rams. At the top was the California deer mouse, which, once mated, remains paired for life.
So what does this tell us? The secret to a happy and lasting marriage should be found in Bieber? Do traditionalists think we should embrace the California deer mouse as a mascot for monogamy (it’s pretty cute)? Or is it that efforts to loosen marital ties, “ethically” or otherwise, are at odds with the essential nature of our species?
The study establishes monogamy as “the dominant mating pattern in our species,” but its implications for us are of course limited, as the study’s author, Dr Mark Dyble, an evolutionary anthropologist at the University of Cambridge, acknowledges. This measures reproductive monogamy, or whether an animal reproduces with multiple partners because “mating and reproduction are closely linked in most mammals.” But humans haven’t been tied down like that for long. This is especially true after birth control was developed.
Unlike other animals, complex cultural norms have always influenced our approach to sexual and romantic pairing. Marriage itself is a relatively recent institution in the 300,000-year history of our species, dating back approximately 4,300 years. Marriage itself served to connect women to men (with property for long periods of time), ensure paternity, and protect the male line.
From the 8th century, Christianity began to intervene, adding more baggage as the state regulated unions between individuals to manage property and inheritance.
Monogamy (reproductive or otherwise) has never been guaranteed through this permutation of pair bonds. This is certainly not always what is expected to be uniform. Historically, women have faced greater social and personal repercussions from infidelity than men.
And focusing solely on Western approaches to mating and reproduction actually eliminates the tremendous diversity among humans. A 2013 study found that only a small number of societies worldwide (reported at 17%) follow strict monogamy. As Dyble points out in the Cambridge study, as a species we have come up with a variety of potential approaches to partnerships, “from serial monogamy to stable polygamy,” and within all of them we have created the conditions for committed parenting.
This is even more surprising when compared to our primate relatives. Mountain gorillas and chimpanzees rank very low on the “monogamous league table” and instead live in non-monogamous groups. But our own preference for monogamy likely evolved from that arrangement.
Seen in this context, the recent reexamination of monogamy seems more like another step in our evolution than an affront to our nature or a threat to our society. Not only has it always allowed for a wide variety of pairings; It has always been fluid and negotiated not only between individuals, but also to suit our society and our times. In fact, considering the enormous amount of load we have packed into our “coupled system,” it is somewhat surprising that it has proven to be very load-bearing yet very flexible.
We may only be mammals, but the Cambridge study is a timely reminder of the diversity within, as well as between, species. The status or health of monogamy cannot be assessed independently of the influence of politics, religion, culture, economics, and, increasingly, technology.
We will continue to develop like this. Perhaps it is not surprising that California deer mice mate for life. The average lifespan in the wild is less than two years.