It is in the genes

Now women can turn around and blame their genes for cuckolding their partners. Britain’s biggest study shows some women may be genetically predisposed to promiscuity, writes Steve Connor

In an attempt to provide a new insight into the old debate on whether individuals are shaped by nature or nature, scientists interviewed 3,200 women, all either identical or non-identical twins, about their sex lives.

They found wide variations in the women's attitudes towards being unfaithful and how many sexual partners they admitted to having.

The average number of sexual partners was between four and five. A little over 20 per cent admitted to being unfaithful in a stable relationship.

Professor Tim Spector, Director of the Twin Research Unit at St Thomas' Hospital in London, said that about 40 per cent of the variation in faithfulness in the group was due to genes, with the rest of the variation due to environment and upbringing or nurture.

"We found that around 40 per cent of the influence on the number of sexual partners and infidelity were due to genetic factors," Professor Spector said.

The figure means that if a woman is unfaithful, her identical twin sister would be twice as likely as average to be unfaithful as well. A non-identical twin sister of an unfaithful woman would be 50 per cent more likely than average to have an affair outside marriage.

Attempts to link infidelity directly to a specific gene or set of genes failed, although the researchers said that they did manage to locate some of the traits to three of the 23 pairs of human chromosomes.

"There is not an infidelity gene, but 50 to 100 genes are important and give us the tendency to respond to our environments in different ways...It may be important for women who commit infidelity," Professor Spector said.

The study, published in the journal Twin Research, suggests that a genetic predisposition toward female infidelity may have evolved because it was important in allowing women married to "low status" men to surreptitiously become pregnant to "high status" males.

"If female infidelity and number of sexual partners are under considerable genetic influence as this study demonstrates, the logical conclusion is that these behaviours persists because they have been evolutionary advantageous for women," the researchers write in their scientific paper.

"Work in the UK has shown that human females generally have affairs with men of higher status than their husbands, perhaps illustrating an effort to mate with a genetically superior partner," they say.

Although the findings came out of a study of just 1,600 pairs of twins, Professor Spector said that he believes the conclusions can be generalised to the wider female population of Britain because the sample is representative of the country at large in terms of social class and ethnic background.

The study was one of many involving more than 10,000 twins who since 1992 have been investigated and interviewed for a whole range of medical and psychological differences from high blood pressure to snoring at night.

"Twins are the perfect natural experiment because they allow you to do what you can't do in families, that is to separate out nature and nurture," Professor Spector said.

"We are taking a group of identical twins that are clones of each other, who have exactly the same environment, compared to a group of non-identical twins who are like brother and sister and share 50 per cent of their genes, and who also have the same environment," he said.

"Everything is perfectly matched in these two groups. So you compare the two, and when you do that you get a clear idea of what the genetic component to [the trait] is," he said.

The average age of the women involved in the infidelity study was 50 with some reporting no extra-marital affairs or no sexual partners while others at the other extreme said they have had over a hundred sex partners.

A quarter of the women were divorced and 98 per cent said they were heterosexual. The researchers calculated that 41 per cent of the variation in infidelity and 38 per cent of the variation in the number of sexual partners could be explained by genes.

Interestingly, there was no genetic basis for attitudes towards infidelity. Professor Spector said that 90 per cent of the women reported having thought about being unfaithful but only one in four actually did anything about it.

"The fact that psychosocial traits such as number of sexual partners and infidelity appear to behave as other common complex genetic traits in humans ... lends support to evolutionary psychologists' theories on the origin of human behaviour," he said.

"Not surprisingly, the average number of sexual partners was significantly higher among respondents who had been unfaithful compared with those who had remained faithful - a mean of eight compared with four," he added.

"It's important that we all don't behave the same way. In terms of our evolution, some people have a high tendency to have multiple partners and to mix the genes. The system would break down if there wasn't any pair bonding," he said.

— The Independent

The never-say-die crusader

Nirmala Deshpande, the septuagenarian Gandhian, does not waste her breath in lashing out against gender bias. Minna Zutshi interviews the feisty activist who is a believer in positive action.

Nirmala Deshpande

No anti-male tirade or ideology-bashing for her. Nirmala Deshpande, the septuagenarian Gandhian associated with the women’s movement at grassroots, finds it puerile when women cry themselves hoarse against atrocities committed against them. “Why cower with fear when you have a reserve of spiritual strength? Those who think that Gandhian philosophy is about submission need to get their facts straight,” she shoots off, her resolute voice a striking contrast to her mild manner.

“There was this woman in a metro whose husband would resort to violence on one pretext or the other. I told her categorically that she should offer resistance and if need be match his aggression” She did exactly that. Her husband was taken aback. The distraught man pleaded with her not to tell anyone that he had received a beating from his wife. A mutual pact was worked out. He would never again hit her and she would keep her counter-attack under wraps,” Deshpande chuckles.

A votary of non-violence, she, however, feels that it takes loads of courage to stand up to the might of aggressors. One of her first lessons in womanpower was when, during her visit to a remote village decades ago, she came across a poetess who had ripped off a portion of her thatched hut to catch a glimpse of the rising sun and have sun’s rays flit across her room everyday. When the poetess’ ma-in-law came to know about this, she was aghast. How could her daughter-in-law be so wayward? She got the hut repaired and forbade her daughter-in-law from her “date” with the morning sun. But the poetess had a clever idea. She told her ma-in-law that being a dutiful wife, she could not eat before partaking of the prasad from the temple in the morning. The ma-in-law relented. Daily on her way to the temple, the poetess would feast her eyes on the rising sun!

Feminists may carry on about objectification of women and veiled injustice, but Deshpande would rather focus on “what can be done to improve the lot of common women.” She shrugs off “feminism. Her “single status” has more to do with her being a “spiritual-seeker” and less to do with any feminist statement, she says. She tells us that she eschews negativism at all costs. “The mystic saint Rabia was once asked why she did not criticise Satan even once in her speech. Her reply was, ‘I always praise Allah, there is no time to condemn Satan.’”

When there are so many issues (women’s self-help groups in villages and their participation in decision-making) that can be handled with a positive approach, why harp on the negative, Deshpande reasons. “I choose not to waste my breath on censuring either beauty contests or erosion of values. Of course, materialism and consumerism have a downside. Her philosophy is Karma yoga. As she says, “When I joined Vinoba Bhave’s Bhoodan Movement in 1952, I did not stay at the Ashram. I walked 40,000 km across the country and mingled with people from all strata. Fiftytwo years later, my journey continues. With due apologies to cynics and their ilk, I feel that over the years the position of women in India has improved, and you can see instances in everyday life.”

Perhaps, like that anonymous sun-dazzled poetess of a remote village, it’s optimism and indomitable will that keep Deshpande going at an age when most wallow in self-pity.

MAKING WAVES
Old Annie casts a spell

Qurratulain Haider is a believer in composite culture

Qurratulain Hyder is a celebrated writer of Urdu who has been a recipient of the Bharatiya Jnanpith award, the most prestigious literary honour of the land. Her writings have been translated into all Indian languages. However, it was only a few years ago that her famed novel, Aag Ka Darya, first published in 1959, came out in English. The reason being that the finical Annie (this was the nickname by which she was addressed by her friends and family) would not trust anyone’s translation. Finally she translated or rather transcreated it herself as The River of Fire. Published by Kali for Women, the English translation achieved an epic status in fiction about the subcontinent.

Qurratulain, who is very conscious about language and its representation, has again made a mark by her own translation. This time it is the translation of her first novel, Mere Bhi Sanamkhane which is called My temples, too in English. It has been published recently by Women Unlimited, an associate of Kali for Women. The novel is set in Annie’s much-loved hometown, Lucknow. However, the novel laments the old-world charm as the young protagonists of the novel see their world go through political upheavals culminating in the Partition.

The novel is an ode to the faded charm of Lucknow and captures the essence of the composite and harmonious culture of the ganga-jumna way of life. It may be recalled that Qurratulain had migrated to Pakistan after the Partition. But she returned for she pined d for the culture of the land she was born too. What upset her among many other things was when she heard a relatives’ child ask, “What is Basant?” the child was referring to the Basant festival. It was not Basant all the way for her back in India for much had changed. Yet, she lived here and wrote with rare passion. Now Qurratulain lives in NOIDA and although ageing she devotes every moment of her life to her writings. — ND