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Monogamy

Close relationships

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Monogamy is the custom or condition of having only one mate in a relationship, thus forming a couple. The word monogamy comes from the Greek word monos, which means one or alone, and the Greek word gamos, which means marriage or union. Serial monogamy is having no more than one sexual partner at a time but allows for multiple partners in a lifetime. In western culture serial monogamy is common; evidence of this is high divorce rates.

Contents 1 Animals 1.1 Mating system 1.2 Evolution in animals 2 Bibliography 3 See also 4 Related links 5 External links

Animals

Mating system

Main article: Animal sexuality

Monogamy is one of several mating systems observed in animals. The amount of social monogamy in animals varies across taxa, with over 90 percent of birds engaging in social monogamy but only 7 percent of mammals engaging in social monogamy. The incidence of sexual monogamy appears quite rare in the animal kingdom. It is becoming clear that even animals that are socially monogamous engage in extra-pair copulations.[1]

Evolution in animals

Main article: Evolution of monogamy

Socially monogamous species are scattered throughout the animal kingdom: A few insects, a few fish, a lot of birds, and a few mammals are socially monogamous. These species did not inherit social monogamy from a common ancestor. Instead, social monogamy has evolved independently in different species.

Bibliography

• Korotayev, Andrey (2004). World Religions and Social Evolution of the Old World Oikumene Civilizations: A Cross-cultural Perspective, First Edition, Lewiston, New York: Edwin Mellen Press. ISBN 0-7734-6310-0. 

See also

• Varieties of monogamy
• Incidence of monogamy
• Value of monogamy
• Psychology of monogamy
• Evolution of monogamy

Related links

External links

• Devra G. Kleiman - Monogamy in mammals http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=857268&dopt=Abstract

• U. Reichard, C. Boesch(Eds.): Monogamy: Mating Strategies and Partnerships in Birds, Humans and Other Mammals: Review. Cambridge University Press, 2003

• Miranda M. Lim, Zuoxin Wang, Daniel E. Olazábal, Xianghui Ren, Ernest F. Terwilliger und Larry J. Young: Enhanced partner preference in a promiscuous species by manipulating the expression of a single gene. Nature 429 (17 June 2004), 754–757.

• "The Virtues of Promiscuity" by Sally Lehrman http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=13648 - on studies showing social and genetic benefits of promiscuity
• The Myth of Monogamy