The wind of betrayal - Why do they need mistresses? it needs to be watered, in the sense that this is a very overgrown science. However, with all the abundance of branches, there is still no one in it that would study adultery. Family issues specialists might be happy to look into the problem, but you won’t question your husband while your wife is alive and present at the session. And everyone else considers betrayal either a variant of the norm, or the revenge of a strict mother, or even a completely trifling symptom of real disorders. Therefore, science cannot give an unambiguous answer to the question of why men cheat - especially since the logical option: “because they are assholes” does not suit it. However, there are some theories about this. WHY WE CHANGE: Where did you get this from? We?! Yes, we never did! Oh yes, this is the same article. Rhetorical subtitle. Phew, otherwise it seemed that the incident with the stenographer at the congress of “People who never cheat on their partner” in Voronezh came up. So, here's what science says about the phenomenon of male infidelity. THEORY 1. HORMONAL There is a hypothesis that first emerged in the reports of King's College London fifty years ago: the hormone vasopressin is responsible for the desire to “spread its influence” in males. Moreover, this hormone spoils not only people: cats, succumbing to its influence, fight in the yard for territory, grizzly bears mark the bark of trees with their claws and even roll stones up to the trunk to put a mark higher. One of the manifestations of “spreading influence” is, of course, the capture and impregnation of as many females as possible. And if in the animal world it is customary to look at this through flippers, then in the human world concierges and grandmothers at the entrance immediately begin to point their fingers at a male tormented by vasopressin. A particularly difficult situation arises when a married person begins to feel the effects of vasopressin. In the first years (sometimes months) of a stable relationship, the effect of vasopressin is suppressed by other hormones: oxytocin, serotonin, testosterone. But the charm of falling in love passes, and the male begins to think where else to move his bored self. If a tree, or a grizzly bear, or some kind of hobby does not turn up at hand, the thought of betrayal becomes almost persistent. THEORY 2. PSYCHOLOGICAL Hormones have long been the main “demons” of science - it was customary to blame all odd behavior on them, and many doctors remain adherents This approach still exists today. And how many magazines write about hormones, randomly shuffling the names... Of course, everything in the body is somewhat more complicated than was described in the previous paragraph. Hormonal storms can be controlled by willpower - provided that everything is in order with the psyche. And if so, betrayal is a conscious choice of a man. Popular, if not tabloid, psychologists insist on this. In the books of Skinner, Pilz and some Russian gurus, the concept of “self-esteem sine wave” is found. In short, any man perceives freedom as loneliness, which means deprivation, and therefore evil. A single man is at the bottom of his self-esteem. Having met a woman, he begins to slowly emerge to the surface and at the top of the sine wave he thinks: “What am I, such a handsome guy, doing next to her?” Inflated self-esteem provokes a breakup - or betrayal. But in both cases, freedom (from moral obligations) again turns into loneliness, or at least into the fear of being left alone. Returns to the old partner begin, pre-rehearsed scenes of “who did you leave me with” and “I’m a fool, a fool” or the search for a new partner. You can ride up and down this sinusoid more or less endlessly. THEORY 3. EVERYDAY As one of the classics said (any other magazine would write that it was Bernard Shaw, but I have neither their confidence nor the Internet to check) when you see.