Affairs usually begin with an attraction to someone you know fairly well, someone you spend time with each week — your friends and co-workers.
Loved-up couples be warned: September has been named the month when affairs are most likely to begin. Overtaking January as the biggest month for infidelity, new research has found those looking to stray are more likely to start an affair in September than any other time of the year.
It is a sad reality that adultery is alive and well in our churches. The Rest: Bars, Spouse's friends, Las Vegas, Business trips, the Gym, Neighbors, Grocery stores, etc. People who cheat can meet just about anywhere.
Extramarital Affairs/Infidelities are common. Most estimates indicate that around 60% of men and 45% of women are willing to report that an affair has occurred sometime in their marriage and it suggests that 70% of all marriages experience an affair.
The one thing all cheaters have in common is a lack of impulse control. Unfortunately, they also tend to be opportunistic and have an inflated sense of their own importance. Not only do serial cheaters adopt similar behavioral habits, but they also share a number of personality traits.
Women in their 60s report the highest rate of infidelity (16%), but the share goes down sharply among women in their 70s and 80s. By comparison, the infidelity rate among men in their 70s is the highest (26%), and it remains high among men ages 80 and older (24%).
Yet, most affairs usually end one of two ways: with divorce or a stronger current relationship. How the end plays out is up to you, how you choose to react, and how hard you want to work to stay together. Learning how to overcome grief and pain is going to be difficult, but Couples Academy can help.
Inappropriate Sharing. Emotional affairs may begin with conversations about work and other topics but they often shift into more intimate details about your life, relationships, personal issues, and sex life.
How long extramarital affairs last varies: about 50% may last between the period of one month to a year affair, long term affairs may last long-term, for about 15 months or more, and about 30% of affairs last about two years and beyond.
In some situations, a spouse may engage in an emotional affair as a way of getting back at their partner or dealing with unaddressed anger or issues. It's a form of acting out, but in a way that might seem less serious than cheating physically.
Emotional cheating is highly common. In fact, the results of one study showed that 78.6 percent of men and 91.6 percent of women had admitted to an emotional affair at some point in their relationship.
Red flags in a relationship include excessive jealousy and frequent lying. You should also be wary of a partner who frequently criticizes you or puts you down. Another major red flag is an unwillingness to compromise — relationships shouldn't be one-sided.
In many cases, people think their spouse is cheating on them because either they've cheated on someone in the past or are about to. Psychologists say that projection is a low-level coping skill, where people who cheat or think of cheating are likely to project the same thoughts on their partners.
Historic data suggests that men have always been more likely to cheat. But in the 1990s, the infidelity rate peaked among men in their 50s. In that decade, older men were less likely to cheat than those who were middle aged. Then, in the 2000s, the highest rate of infidelity shifted to men in their 60s.
Research in the field of infidelity reveals that there are three distinct personality types correlated with a higher likelihood of cheating: sociopaths, narcissists, and lonely hearts.
Research from the past two decades shows that between 20 and 25 percent of married men cheat and between 10 and 15 percent of married women cheat, according to professor Nicholas Wolfinger. Read more here.
Here's what we do know about the prevalence of cheating. A 2021 survey by Health Testing Centers polled 441 people and reported: a little over 46% of respondents in a monogamous relationship said they had affairs. nearly 24% of marriages affected by infidelity reported staying together.