Mistress and Slave continue our
efforts to find a little privacy as we cope with our newly crowded house. Sex in the morning, before we hear our
little “Divas in training” up and about is one way. Then yesterday, before Mistress headed to our swim club, and
I went to stop by to check out my grandkids, we discovered that our kids had
suddenly disappeared. I was able
to coax Mistress into a few moments of worship before she went on her “sun
worship” mission.
“Do you mind just sliding my
bathing suit aside, Slave…..”
“Of course not, Mistress….”
For once she did not have to
suppress those little sounds of delight as I went about my business.
But today’s entry has a higher
purpose than simply the play-by-play from here in our re-infested nest. I am
reporting on an intriguing summary of recent scientific research that suggests
there may be a genetic explanation for a woman’s impulse to cuckold her
mate. In this morning’s NY Times
there is an opinion piece (Infidelity Lurks in Our Genes) by science writer Richard Friedman about how genes may
pre-determine what he describes as “infidelity”, but presumably also
incorporates the contractual right to enjoy the company of an occasional “side
dish” that Mistress enjoys.
We
have long known that men have a genetic, evolutionary impulse to cheat, because
that increases the odds of having more of their offspring in the world.
But
now there is intriguing new research showing that some women, too, are
biologically inclined to wander, although not for clear evolutionary benefits.
Women who carry certain variants of the vasopressin receptor gene are much more
likely to engage in “extra pair bonding,” the scientific euphemism for sexual
infidelity.
Brendan
P. Zietsch, a psychologist at the University of Queensland, Australia, has
tried to determine whether some people are just more inclined toward
infidelity. In a study of nearly 7,400 Finnish twins and their siblings who had
all been in a relationship for at least one year, Dr. Zietsch looked at the
link between promiscuity and specific variants of vasopressin and oxytocin
receptor genes. Vasopressin is a hormone that has powerful effects on social
behaviors like trust, empathy and sexual bonding in humans and other animals.
So it makes sense that mutations in the vasopressin receptor gene — which can
alter its function — could affect human sexual behavior.
He
found that 9.8 percent of men and 6.4 percent of women reported that they had
two or more sexual partners in the previous year. His study, published last year in Evolution and Human Behavior,
found a significant association between five different variants of the
vasopressin gene and infidelity in women only and no relationship between the
oxytocin genes and sexual behavior for either sex. That was impressive: Forty
percent of the variation in promiscuous behavior in women could be attributed
to genes. That is surprising since, as Dr. Zietsch points out, there are so
many other factors that are necessary for promiscuous encounters, like circumstance
and the availability of a willing and able partner. Although this is the
largest and best study on this, it’s not clear why there was no relationship
between the vasopressin gene and promiscuous behavior in men.
The article goes onto describe
tests conducted on two variations of the vole “family” that may confirm this
genetic impulse to stray from the marital bed. It turns out that Montane Voles
are prone to have a wandering eye, while Prairie Voles are relatively
monogamous. Until the evil scientist begins his experiment:
In
the monogamous prairie voles, the vasopressin receptors are close to the
brain’s reward center, but in the philandering montane voles, these same
receptors are mostly found in the amygdala, a brain region that is critical to
processing anxiety and fear.
So
mating for the prairie voles activates the pleasurable reward pathway, which
reinforces mating and promotes attachment and thus monogamy. For the
promiscuous montane voles, sex has little effect on attachment; any vole will
do.
It
is even possible experimentally to take a home-wrecking montane vole and make
him behave like a family-oriented prairie vole. Using a virus as a delivery
vehicle to transmit the vasopressin receptor gene, it’s easy to artificially
boost the number of vasopressin receptors in the brain’s reward center, and
make a male vole behave monogamously. The story for female voles is similar
except that it is oxytocin, not vasopressin, that triggers monogamous behavior.
Of course, all of this potential
for genetic manipulation has Slave’s imagination running wild:
1) Could
you make a potential spouse undergo a genetic test to calculate the likelihood that
they would or would not take up with other lovers during the course of a
marriage?
2) If
you feared a spouse was “cheating” could you order up a cocktail of “vasopressin”
or “oxytocin” to get them back in line?
3) And,
even more deviously, suppose your wife had her eye on some guy who was married
and annoyingly anonymous. Could
you spike his drink with a batch of genetic material that would make him more
likely to loose his inhibitions?
All of this also made Slave wonder if
there is a genetic explanation for what makes Slave enjoy it when his hot
Mistress falls into the arms of another guy. Do you think male Montane Voles get off when their female mate reports back on her encounter with another male Montane Vole? I guess I should have taken more science classes in college.
