Abstract
With statistics indicating that one out of every two marriages in the United States ends in a divorce, the validity of monogamous marriages has come under fire. Are humans truly capable of maintaining monogamous marriages or are they constraining their sexuality by doing so? The research entails two different perspectives while analyzing human monogamy; monogamy as a mating pattern and monogamy as a marriage pattern. The reason being that monogamy is solely not an evolved phenomenon but also a socialized one throughout most cultures. While analyzing monogamy as a mating pattern, several occurrences throughout our evolution allowed humans the ability to maintain monogamous relationships. Mutated traits among females, such as extended receptivity and hidden ovulation, along with bipedalism and male parental involvement worked together to allow humans the ability to have monogamous relationships. Though monogamy is not purely an evolved phenomenon but also a socialized one; there are certain sociological reasons behind why select cultures chose different marriage patterns. Overall, marriages in the west are not vanishing because humans are not able to hold monogamous relationships; rather, it is the definition of monogamy that is evolving.
Included in
Biological and Physical Anthropology Commons, Family, Life Course, and Society Commons, Gender and Sexuality Commons, Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons