On a lighter side, this study reinforces (by a small quantity, due to all the caveat outlined in the comments) my idea that women are as promiscuous as men, but they are culturally forced to lie about that: not really big news.
On a more interesting side, the “fake lie detector” is another one of the techniques that are used to circumvent lies that occur even in anonymous surveys: the first that I heard of, anyway, was employed in a survey regarding illegal owning/hunting/farming of something in some parts of Africa (yes, I’ve lost almost all the details: can someone point me to the original article?). It consisted of telling people that for some answers, you need not to answer truthfully, instead you needed to throw secretly a dice and report the answer that came up. Apparently this, instead of randomizing the answer, gave the ‘farmer’ an excuse to tell the truth (yes, I really need to dig up the source).
ETA: see Alicorn’s comment for the exact reference.
On a lighter side, this study reinforces (by a small quantity, due to all the caveat outlined in the comments) my idea that women are as promiscuous as men, but they are culturally forced to lie about that: not really big news.
Keep in mind that this study only reflects upon individuals born between 1978-1985. Based on the recent increase in entertainment promoting promiscuous behavior (ie. the American Pie series, EuroTrip, ), I expect that current attitudes (of 18-25 y/o’s) would differ, even from those in 2003.
Well, the study has its limits, and this could be another one of them, so as I said it’s far from conclusive. However, in this particular case, I wonder if the kind of entertainment that you indicate really nudges young adults sexuality or limits to expose a widely known but denied truth (in Italy we say “Punchinello’s secret”, also when someone declares that he has discovered something that everybody else knew very well in advance, it’s said that he has “discovered hot water”). I’m thinking for example of pornographic movies, that exist since the beginning of cinematography, and it’s not that the women were particularly forced to star in them… Of course not even this is strong evidence, though it’s still something. In my opinion, the biggest piece of evidence in favor of women’s promiscuity are sperm wars.
Also, I think there are random factors affecting which art gets made. What gets popular is a subset of what happens to get made, not a clear indicator of the minds in the audience.
On a lighter side, this study reinforces (by a small quantity, due to all the caveat outlined in the comments) my idea that women are as promiscuous as men, but they are culturally forced to lie about that: not really big news.
What do you mean by “equally promiscuous”? Do you mean that women and men have the same average number of sex partners? Than this follows from basic arithmetic and I don’t see why this study is relevant. Do you mean that they have the same average desired number of partners? Than this study has nothing to say on the subject.
What do you mean by “equally promiscuous”? Do you mean that women and men have the same average number of sex partners?
Yes, of course.
Than this follows from basic arithmetic and I don’t see why this study is relevant.
Why everybody keep saying this? It’s true only if the group surveyed is closed under the “sexual partnership” relation, which is hardly the case in any study. An extreme example: a population of 10 men and 10 women, in which all the women have sex with just one man. Then in any group not closed under sexual partnerhsip the average for women is always 1 and for men is always 0, correctly indicating that women are more promiscuous than men. The average is trivially equal only if the group is extended to the whole population, but in that case the average is not a good indicator of promiscuity (see the above example). The study is indeed interesting because there are bound to be asymmetries, and it shows that they are skewed towards women.
Why everybody keep saying this? It’s true only if the group surveyed is closed under the “sexual partnership” relation, which is hardly the case in any study.
Unless the group surveyed is deliberately gerrymandered for that, I doubt that would make for a very large difference. If the difference is 10%, as in this study, I have no trouble believing that, especially considering this (though there probably are other sources of noise); but if someone finds nothing obviously wrong with the studies without a fake lie detector where the difference is a factor of 2, and when the arithmetic argument is pointed out to them they say that maybe the group surveyed wasn’t closed under sexual partnership, I would call that clutching at straws.
Do you mean that women and men have the same average number of sex partners? Than this follows from basic arithmetic and I don’t see why this study is relevant.
And yet the previous studies found otherwise, and were interpreted as confirming that men are more promiscuous than women.
On a lighter side, this study reinforces (by a small quantity, due to all the caveat outlined in the comments) my idea that women are as promiscuous as men, but they are culturally forced to lie about that: not really big news.
On a more interesting side, the “fake lie detector” is another one of the techniques that are used to circumvent lies that occur even in anonymous surveys: the first that I heard of, anyway, was employed in a survey regarding illegal owning/hunting/farming of something in some parts of Africa (yes, I’ve lost almost all the details: can someone point me to the original article?). It consisted of telling people that for some answers, you need not to answer truthfully, instead you needed to throw secretly a dice and report the answer that came up. Apparently this, instead of randomizing the answer, gave the ‘farmer’ an excuse to tell the truth (yes, I really need to dig up the source).
ETA: see Alicorn’s comment for the exact reference.
Are you thinking of this?
Thank you Alicorn, it was exactly that (although I learned of its existence from a different source than Lesswrong).
Keep in mind that this study only reflects upon individuals born between 1978-1985. Based on the recent increase in entertainment promoting promiscuous behavior (ie. the American Pie series, EuroTrip, ), I expect that current attitudes (of 18-25 y/o’s) would differ, even from those in 2003.
Well, the study has its limits, and this could be another one of them, so as I said it’s far from conclusive. However, in this particular case, I wonder if the kind of entertainment that you indicate really nudges young adults sexuality or limits to expose a widely known but denied truth (in Italy we say “Punchinello’s secret”, also when someone declares that he has discovered something that everybody else knew very well in advance, it’s said that he has “discovered hot water”).
I’m thinking for example of pornographic movies, that exist since the beginning of cinematography, and it’s not that the women were particularly forced to star in them… Of course not even this is strong evidence, though it’s still something.
In my opinion, the biggest piece of evidence in favor of women’s promiscuity are sperm wars.
Also, I think there are random factors affecting which art gets made. What gets popular is a subset of what happens to get made, not a clear indicator of the minds in the audience.
What do you mean by “equally promiscuous”? Do you mean that women and men have the same average number of sex partners? Than this follows from basic arithmetic and I don’t see why this study is relevant. Do you mean that they have the same average desired number of partners? Than this study has nothing to say on the subject.
Yes, of course.
Why everybody keep saying this? It’s true only if the group surveyed is closed under the “sexual partnership” relation, which is hardly the case in any study.
An extreme example: a population of 10 men and 10 women, in which all the women have sex with just one man. Then in any group not closed under sexual partnerhsip the average for women is always 1 and for men is always 0, correctly indicating that women are more promiscuous than men.
The average is trivially equal only if the group is extended to the whole population, but in that case the average is not a good indicator of promiscuity (see the above example).
The study is indeed interesting because there are bound to be asymmetries, and it shows that they are skewed towards women.
Unless the group surveyed is deliberately gerrymandered for that, I doubt that would make for a very large difference. If the difference is 10%, as in this study, I have no trouble believing that, especially considering this (though there probably are other sources of noise); but if someone finds nothing obviously wrong with the studies without a fake lie detector where the difference is a factor of 2, and when the arithmetic argument is pointed out to them they say that maybe the group surveyed wasn’t closed under sexual partnership, I would call that clutching at straws.
And yet the previous studies found otherwise, and were interpreted as confirming that men are more promiscuous than women.
Here it is.
Perhaps KZN rangers could undergo polygraph tests ?