Anonymous: Women marry believing that their husbands will change; Men marry believing that their wives will not change; They're both wrong. (p.168)
In sum, three major general circumstances could lead someone to leave a long-term mate: when a current mate became less desirable because of a decrease in abilities or resources or a failure to provide the reproductively relevant resources that were inherent in the initial selection, when someone experienced an increase in resources or reputation that opened up previously unobtainable mating possibilities, and when compelling alternatives became available. (p.171)
Men and women evaluate alternative mating possibilities, even if they have no immediate intention to act upon them. It pays to plan ahead. (p.171)
Men and women say that effective tactics for prompting mates to depart include treating them badly, insulting them to others publicly, intentionally hurting their feelings, creating a fight, yelling without explanation, and escalating a trivial disagreement into a fight (p.181)
The major causes of marital dissolution worldwide are those that historically caused damage to the reproductive success of one spouse by imposing reproductive costs and interfering with preferred mating strategies. The most damaging events and changes are in fidelity, which can reduce a husband's confidence in paternity and can deprive a wife of some or all of the husband's resources; infertility, which renders a couple childless; sexual withdrawal, which deprives a husband of access to a wife's reproductive value or signals to a wife that he is channeling his resources elsewhere; a man's failure to provide economic support, which deprives a woman of the reproductively relevant resources inherent in her initial choice of a mate; a man's acquisition of additional wives, which diverts resources from a particular spouse; and unkindness, which signals abuse, defection, affairs, and an unwillingness or inability to engage in the formation of a cooperative alliance. (p.181)
( David M. Buss – The Evolution of Desire )
