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> In cultures that permit men to take multiple wives, the intra-sexual competition that occurs causes greater levels of crime, violence, poverty and gender ineq

> In cultures that permit men to take multiple wives, the intra-sexual competition that occurs causes greater levels of crime, violence, poverty and gender inequality than in societies that institutionalize and practice monogamous marriage. Wouldn't that just be any culture that has a significantly offset male-female ratio?

ap3 11y ago
In a specific cohort lets say age 18-35 - is the only thing that matters for this study "access" to women not how many women a man can married? Wonder what the polygamy male-female ratio is compared to current societies with skewed ratios (CN / IN)?
- beccasanchez 11y ago
  By "access" are you just referring to prostitution?
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > In a specific cohort lets say age 18-35 - is the only thing that matters for this study "access" to women not how many women a man can married? No. What seems to matter in the study is whether men have acceptable marriage prospects. (It'd be interesting to see, in that context, whether permitting same-sex marriage reinforces the effect observed and further reduces the same problems. It'd also be interesting to see, as marriage itself becomes less of an expectation, whether the effect is more from men being married -- in which case denormalizing marriage would be expected to reverse the benefits -- or whether the effect is more from men not being alienated by being unable to meet a social expectation of marriage -- in which case denormalizing marriage would be expected to reinforce the benefits.)
Shivetya 11y ago
My question would be, does this behavior hold up regardless of the culture's average income level? Surely some of the cultures are doing this because the poverty level is great. sarcasm, polygamy and monogamy have the same major social problem, one spouse too many.
dragonwriter 11y ago
> Wouldn't that just be any culture that has a significantly offset male-female ratio? A significantly-greater-than-1.0 male-to-female ratio would be a different cause of the same problem; polygyny produces it even without that ratio difference. (Polyandry would seem, in principle, to offset it, but there aren't lots of historical examples of that to study.)

ap3 11y ago

In a specific cohort lets say age 18-35 - is the only thing that matters for this study "access" to women not how many women a man can married? Wonder what the polygamy male-female ratio is compared to current societies with skewed ratios (CN / IN)?

beccasanchez 11y ago
By "access" are you just referring to prostitution?
dragonwriter 11y ago
> In a specific cohort lets say age 18-35 - is the only thing that matters for this study "access" to women not how many women a man can married? No. What seems to matter in the study is whether men have acceptable marriage prospects. (It'd be interesting to see, in that context, whether permitting same-sex marriage reinforces the effect observed and further reduces the same problems. It'd also be interesting to see, as marriage itself becomes less of an expectation, whether the effect is more from men being married -- in which case denormalizing marriage would be expected to reverse the benefits -- or whether the effect is more from men not being alienated by being unable to meet a social expectation of marriage -- in which case denormalizing marriage would be expected to reinforce the benefits.)

Shivetya 11y ago

My question would be, does this behavior hold up regardless of the culture's average income level? Surely some of the cultures are doing this because the poverty level is great. sarcasm, polygamy and monogamy have the same major social problem, one spouse too many.

dragonwriter 11y ago

> Wouldn't that just be any culture that has a significantly offset male-female ratio? A significantly-greater-than-1.0 male-to-female ratio would be a different cause of the same problem; polygyny produces it even without that ratio difference. (Polyandry would seem, in principle, to offset it, but there aren't lots of historical examples of that to study.)