Psicologia

Evolutionary Psychology
www.epjournal.net – 2008. 6(4): 667-675

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Are Sexual and Emotional Infidelity Equally Upsetting to Men and Women? Making Sense of Forced-Choice Responses
David A. Lishner, Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, Oshkosh, WI, USA. Email: lishnerd@uwosh.edu (Corresponding author) Shannon Nguyen, Department of Psychology,University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, Oshkosh, WI, USA. E. L. Stocks, Department of Psychology, University of Texas at Tyler, TX, USA. Emily J. Zillmer, Department of Psychology, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh, Oshkosh, WI, USA.

Abstract: Forced-choice measures that assess reactions to imagined sexual and emotional infidelity are ubiquitous in studies testing the Jealousy as a Specific InnateModule (JSIM) model. One potential problem with such measures is that they fail to identify respondents who find both forms of infidelity equally upsetting. To examine this issue, an experiment was conducted in which two groups of participants imagined a romantic infidelity after which participants in the first group used a traditional forced-choice measure to indicate whether they found sexual oremotional infidelity more upsetting. Participants in the second group instead used a modified forced-choice measure that allowed them also to indicate whether they found both forms of infidelity equally upsetting. Consistent with previous research, those given the traditional forced-choice measure tended to respond in a manner that supported the JSIM model. However, the majority of participants giventhe modified measure indicated that both forms of infidelity were equally upsetting. Keywords: Infidelity, Sex Differences, JSIM Model, Jealousy, Romantic Relationships
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Introduction Relationship researchers have become increasingly interested in evolutionary approaches to understanding human experience andbehavior (Barkow, Cosmides, and Tooby, 1992; Buss, 1995). In the domain of romantic relationships, such approaches have generated a great deal of research and debate regarding the evolutionary function of romantic jealousy (Buss et al., 1999; DeSteno and Salovey, 1996; Harris, 2000, 2003; Sagarin, 2005). One of the more influential but controversial views of romantic jealousy is provided by theJealousy as Specific Innate Module (JSIM) model, which claims that men and women differ in their relative sensitivity to emotional versus sexual relationship threats. According to the model, women should experience greater jealousy in response to their partner’s emotional infidelity than should men, who in turn should experience greater

Infidelity and forced choice jealousy in response to theirpartner’s sexual infidelity than should women (Barrett, Frederick, Haselton, and Kurzban, 2006; Buss and Haselton, 2005). The JSIM Model The JSIM model proposes that sex differences in jealousy reactions arise from sexually dimorphic jealousy modules that have evolved as a consequence of distinct reproductive pressures that have faced men and women (Buss, Larsen, Westen, and Semmelroth, 1992). Womenface potential resource loss for their offspring to female rivals when their partner engages in emotional infidelity, whereas men face paternity uncertainty when their partner engages in sexual infidelity. To the extent that romantic jealousy motivates successful avoidance of resource loss to rivals in women and successful avoidance of paternity uncertainty in men, natural selection would favor theemergence of sex differences in the relative emotional sensitivity to sexual and emotional infidelity. Different Interpretations of the Model Theorists agree that the JSIM model predicts gender differences in reactions to romantic infidelity, but questions of interpretation have emerged at various times in the literature. For example, some claim that the model predicts a cross-over gender...