Survey Says Men And Women Cheat For Totally Different Reasons
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How often have we heard that men and women are different from each other? We think & feel differently, we expect & react differently, and we communicate differently. It is no surprise then that women and men cheat for different reasons too.
The emotional and psychologicalmakeup of men and women plays a huge role in what they perceive to be Infidelity. The actions that one may believe to be within appropriate boundaries of acceptable behavior, thereby not construing it as cheating, may, in fact, be considered as cheating by the other.
Infidelity has existed since the beginning. As worrying as it is, it is not uncommon to hear about external romantic affairs. It could happen to couples who’ve been in a long-term relationship; it could happen to newlyweds, or to anyone in between. While over the course of time the reasons for it may vary, at its core it occurs at two levels—emotional & physical.
Emotional Cheating
Most often cheating is synonymous with it being at a physical level. However, emotional cheating is very much a thing and also very common. Women are most likely to emotionally cheat on their partners.
Women are more likely to deeply feel an emotional loss and disconnect in a relationship. If they feel that their partner is unable to be emotionally present for them or fulfill their emotional needs, the longing and yearning for an emotional connection may lead them to look for it in others outside their relationship.
Emotional cheating may also occur out of a sense to be desired – to feel loved, to feel needed, special, and important. Women who feel that their partners no longer desire them as they did before, or are not giving them enough attention, may stray in a relationship. They try and seek this emotional comfort and connect in another.
While partners involved may occasionally engage in a physical relationship, not all would do so. Adultery of this kind is more at an emotional level which can be intimate in its own way. Casual flirting, daily exchange of messages, sharing tidbits about your daily life, may then blossom into sharing intimate details about each other’s life thereby wanting to be constantly connected and around one another. This naturally results in them becoming more distant from their own partners causing the beginnings of a rift in their primary relationship.
Emotional cheating may give one a sense of fulfilment, contentment, and a feeling of belonging, and everything that they feel they’ve been missing in their relationships and marriage – mainly that their partners weren’t really there for them when they needed them, or that they started having doubts about their relationship which caused them to explore options elsewhere.
When feelings are involved, the intimacy of infidelity at an emotional level can be just as bad as one at a physical level.
Physical Cheating
Men are more prone to engage in forms of physical cheating. In this case, there is more of a physical attraction than an emotional one to another person, often the attention they receive is appealing enough to engage in the act of adultery. Women are known to have more self-control and hence are less likely to cheat on their partners solely on the basis of another’s physical attraction.
Lack of sexual intensity, or activity, more than the desire to be needed as is the case with emotional cheating, is reason enough for men to look outside their relationship to rekindle the excitement. While women consider this cheating, most men would, unfortunately, tend to look at it as a purely physical act with no romantic or emotional connotations to it, and hence not exactly cheating.
Lust is also very frequently the cause of physical cheating. Men may not necessarily have fallen out of love with their partners to feel lust. They can still be very much attached and committed to their partners, and yet cheat on them. Men may find that the attraction is strong enough for them to cheat even if the effect of it could be temporary. In exactly the same way boredom in a relationship may push men to look for someone outside their relationship to renew interest and excitement in their lives. Sometimes it could even be because they could cheat and so they went ahead and did it.
Trust
The modern age has given means to different ways of cheating. Men especially use social media – namely apps like Tinder, more frequently for cheating. They may not be physically or emotionally involved, but their search for a partner online, whether to merely flirt with or at a later date engage in a more serious form of adultery with, would still be considered as cheating by others. How often have we come across married men, or ones with partners, lurking online looking to start an affair? It is a betrayal of trust. Being one of the foundations on the basis of which a relationship is formed, this one cannot be easily overlooked.
In the end, whatever the reasons may be, a cheating partner is never an easy thing to overcome. Cheating whether emotionally or physically is a betrayal that few would deem worthy of forgiveness. Men and women may cheat for different reasons, but at its core, it is perhaps time to really look at, and acknowledge, that there is a serious problem in the relationship that needs to be dealt with.
Lack of communication in couples leads to misunderstandings, and missed opportunities, at recognizing and dealing with issues before they escalate into infidelity and thus result at the beginning of an end to a relationship. So much heartache could be avoided and addressed with taking the first step – which is communication. Talk to your partner if something is bothering you or amiss in your relationship. It may not always result in happy endings, but it could at least spare each person involved the humiliation, pain, and suffering, that comes with cheating. And who knows, maybe save and rekindle the romance & relationship.
