It's not only men that are programmed to cheat, science says women are too

oge okonkwo

August 25, 2015 5:20 PM

A new study conducted by the University of Queensland finding that women who possess variants of the "infidelity gene", AVPR1A, are more likely to cheat on their partners than those without it

Cheating Wife

According to Sarah Duncan of SheKnows, researchers from the University of Queensland have discovered an "infidelity gene", which could be the reason some women are tempted to cheat.

Once a cheater, always a cheater. That's how the saying goes and it could be right, with a new study conducted by the University of Queensland finding that women who possess variants of the "infidelity gene", AVPR1A, are more likely to cheat on their partners than those without it.

In a study of more than 7,000 people, it was found that women who had cheated before were more likely to have the AVPR1A gene variant.

The infidelity gene, as it's been dubbed, is said to affect women's social and sexual behaviours and, as a result, they are more likely to engage in "extrapair mating", the researchers reported.

But the thing is, it was found that the gene only affects women. So does that mean women can go around blaming their sexual promiscuity on the infidelity gene then? Well, not quite, but the researchers did find that genetic makeup does play a significant part in it all.

While men don't necessarily have the infidelity gene, it was found in a previous study that 63 per cent of men and 40 per cent of women who are unfaithful to their partners do have specific gene variations that could affect their behaviour and sexual relations.

The study also went on to explain that, while there are evolutionary reasons why men might be predisposed to engaging in sexual relations with people other than their partner — because more sexual partners means more potential offspring — for women, the reason to cheat or have sexual encounters outside of their relationship is less defined.

"Overall, these findings confirm genetic underpinnings of extrapair mating in humans, but do not suggest that women's predisposition to extrapair mating is due to selection of men," the paper read.

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