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Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:861873 DOI 10.1007/s10508-012-9930-x
ORIGINAL PAPER
Sexual Indelity in China: Prevalence and Gender-Specic Correlates
Na Zhang William L. Parish Yingying Huang
Suiming Pan
Received: 13 June 2010 / Revised: 26 July 2011 / Accepted: 14 January 2012 / Published online: 28 April 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012
Abstract The nature of extra-relational sex in societies with rapidly changing sexual mores and widespread commercial sex remains under-explored. The 2006 Sexuality Survey of China provides a national probability survey with data on 3,567 people 1849yearsoldwhowereinamarital(89%)ordating/cohabiting (11%) relationship. In attitudes, extramarital sex was completely unacceptableto74%ofwomenand60%ofmenandeithersome-what or completely unacceptable to 95% of women and men. Most (77%) women wanted severe punishment of mens short-termcommercialsexandwomensjealousywasequallyelevated by their primary partners episodes of commercial and non-commercial sex. Nevertheless, the prevalence of indelity during the last 12monthswas4.5%(womensnon-commercial sex),11.0% (mens non-commercial), and 5.5% (mens commercial), with each percent matching or exceeding the median for other countries. In multivariate equations for non-commercial indelity, mens indelity was signicantly more responsive to sexual dissatisfaction with his primary partner while womens was more responsive to decits in love. In commercial sex, men were uninuenced by primarypartner decitsin love, sexual satisfaction or oral sexpursuing, it would seem, simply a greater variety of sex-
ual partners. In atrading uppattern, women partnered with low income men had elevated indelity. The minority of women reporting early masturbation and premarital sex were just as likely asmen with these backgrounds to have elevated indelity. The Chinese patterns provide ample material for deliberations on gender similarities and differences in extra-relational sex.
Keywords Indelity Extramarital sex Extrapair sex
Gender differences China Commercial sex
Introduction
Using a national probability sample from China, this article examined on a range of questions surrounding indelity (mostly just extramarital sex but also extra partners among people with a stable partner of at least a years duration). Much as in many former socialist societiesinEurope,isit possiblethatChinese abhorrence of extramarital sex has softened (Widmer, Treas, & Newcomb, 1998;Zhengetal.,2011)?Moreover,becauseittypicallyinvolves short-term relationships with little or no emotional commitment, dowomenndahusbands/partnerssexwithfemalesexworkers (FSW) more tolerable (Buss, 1994; Zheng, 2009)? Paralleling a rapid rise in divorce, has the prevalence of extramarital sex in China reached levels that rival or exceed those of other countries (Farrer & Sun, 2003; Pan, 2002)? Does extra partnering outside stable relationships...