A common urban myth is that many fathers are cuckolded into raising children that genetically are not their own, a fear fueled by the paternity tests that have become a standard staple of gossip magazines, talk shows, and TV series. Now Carl Zimmer reports at the NYT that our obsession with cuckolded fathers is seriously overblown as a number of recent genetic studies have challenged the notion that mistaken paternity is commonplace.
It wasn’t until DNA sequencing emerged in the 1990s that paternity tests earned the legal system’s confidence. Labs were able to compare DNA markers in children to those of their purported fathers to see if they matched. As the lab tests piled up, researchers collated the results and came to a startling conclusion: Ten percent to 30 percent of the tested men were not the biological fathers of their children. There's only one problem with these previous studies: the results didn’t come from a random sample of people. The people who ordered the tests already had reason to doubt paternity.
In a 2013 study, Dr. Maarten H.D. Larmuseau used Belgium’s detailed birth records to reconstruct large family genealogies reaching back four centuries. Then the scientists tracked down living male descendants and asked to sequence their Y chromosomes. Y chromosomes are passed down in almost identical form from fathers to sons. Men who are related to the same male ancestor should also share his Y chromosome, providing that some unknown father didn’t introduce his own Y somewhere along the way. Comparing the chromosomes of living related men, Larmuseau came up with a cuckoldry rate of less than 1 percent.
Similar studies have generally produced the same low results in such countries as Spain, Italy and Germany, as well as agricultural villages in Mali. "The observed low EPP [(extra-pair paternity)] rates challenge the idea that women routinely ‘shop around’ for good genes by engaging in extra-pair copulations," concludes Larmuseau . "The (potential) genetic benefits of extrapair children are unlikely to be offset by the (potential) costs of being caught, particularly in such a long-lived species as humans with heavy offspring dependence and massive parental investment."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @10:18AM
Issues with this article, as mentioned on the green site:
Comparing a study of the last 400 years vs a study of the last generation (with significant cultural changes).
Using Y-chromosome to determine parenthood, when brothers often have the same Y-chromosome.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @11:26AM
Not to mention the Wife could cheat, have a daughter, and be counted as faithful in these studies because unless the daughter gets a Y chromosome due a rare genetic disorder that makes her have a xxy set. She isn't counted.
And yes, the low mutation rate of the Y chromosome is so well known they use it to track population migrations throughout the last 100 thousand years.
(Score: 1) by tfried on Wednesday April 13 2016, @12:09PM
the Wife could cheat, have a daughter
And the rate of that occurrence would be expected to differ from cheating and having a son?
(Score: 1, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @12:19PM
It would differ in the study linked up top because they only tracked the Y chromosome to determine who's the parent.
Only males(barring some rare genetic disorders) have the Y chromosome. Thus if a cheating wife has a daughter but had a son with her legit partner, she is counted as faithful in this study when she isn't.
This is ON TOP of the fact the Y chromosome changes so slowly that you(if you're a guy) and a random male neighbor in your neighborhood can have the exact copys. It's a deeply flawed study to try to make humans appear as monogamous when all evidence points to the contrary.
(Score: 3, Disagree) by tfried on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:26PM
they only tracked the Y chromosome to determine who's the parent
Exactly. And they ignored all offspring not expected to carry a Y chromosome. Because, you see, their point was not to prove individual women guilty of cheating, but to estimate the rate of it happening. For this purpose it is perfectly ok to look at male children, only, and derive the estimate from that.
Not qualified to comment on your other point. But this one is moot.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @05:07PM
And yet, you miss the point. By only focusing on the Y chromosome they have a HUGE selection bias in that they are ignoring roughly 50% of potential offspring. That's flaw 1.
Flaw 2 is the part of the human genome they used changes not only very rarely that it's near to basically useless at determining WHO fathered which son. It's great for determining ancient migration patterns and determining where groups came from. As in the native Americans coming from Asia. Because it's mutation rate is slow and predictable, every few thousand years.
Yet for determining paternity it's useless because it's more likely to be passed on intact between father and son to the point that you could find the exact same copy of the Y chromosome in a random unrelated neighbor.
Genealogy records, especially ones not backed by proper genetic paternity testing also constitute a major flaw.
(Score: 4, Informative) by careysub on Wednesday April 13 2016, @08:23PM
"And yet, you miss the point. By only focusing on the Y chromosome they have a HUGE selection bias in that they are ignoring roughly 50% of potential offspring. That's flaw 1."
The sex of a child is random. This is a very, very well established fact. Attempts to circumvent this, or to make guesses as to an infants sex, have always failed consistently until recent times allowed directly examining the sex of the fetus through genetic testing.
How can this then introduce "selection bias"? The basis of statistics is the ability to take a random sample to make an assessment of the entire population. Just because natural forces made the the selection for us does not invalidate it in any way.
"Flaw 2 is the part of the human genome they used changes not only very rarely that it's near to basically useless at determining WHO fathered which son"
So you didn't bother to look at the study? I am astonished.
The study does not attempt to determine WHO fathered which son. It is determining the rate at which the Y haplotype from a paternal ancestor fails to match the expected haplotype of descendant. This is very different from "determining paternity". The negligible rate of mutation is an advantage here, since there a fixed distribution of haplotypes in the population over the 7 generations studied.
"Genealogy records, especially ones not backed by proper genetic paternity testing also constitute a major flaw."
This remark is simply bewildering. Matching genealogy records against actual Y-chromosome descent is the very purpose of the study. The deviation between actual parentage and recorded parentage (genealogy) is the definition of "cuckoldry" here.
Basically your objections come to nothing. Read the study first before you critique its methods.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Wednesday April 13 2016, @07:03PM
It's a deeply flawed study to try to make humans appear as monogamous when all evidence points to the contrary.
Ah! The time honored principle of research assessment! "Do I agree with the conclusion?" "No!" "Therefore, the study is deeply flawed." And then we go one better! Since this study is deeply flawed, per our earlier inference, the opposite of its conclusion must be the case, on the principle of argumentum ad ignorantiam and by the "all evidence" which is neither provided or referenced. Well done, promiscuous and cuckolded Anoymous Coward!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @12:51PM
I know more families that have all boy or all girl children than those with mixed.
Perhaps there is something genetic that biases such child birth, and if so, then there could be genetics which influence brain chemistry and possibly cheating behavior as well.
Speculative, sure, but I'm not going to rule out the possibility.
What if you're prone to having little girls, and having little girls around drives a woman to cheat, perhaps based on latent self comparison and jealousy of close father daughter bonds?
Or, perhaps not cheat, it could go either way.
I could probably sit here all day and think up reasons why the sex of your child could influence your likelihood to cheat or not.
(Score: 3, Informative) by tfried on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:45PM
I know more families that have all boy or all girl children than those with mixed.
http://www.ingender.com/Gender-info/Odds-of-having-all-boys-or-girls.aspx#Comparison [ingender.com]
(Though, actually, depending on the number of children in those families, your observation is actually to be expected: 100% of single child families have either "all boys" or "all girls", by definition. For two child families the theoretic odds are 50/50, and for three child families it's still a solid 25%.)
Speculative, sure, but I'm not going to rule out the possibility.
Nothing wrong with idle speculation. But that does not make for a terribly valid criticism of the study.
(Score: 2, Redundant) by linkdude64 on Wednesday April 13 2016, @12:48PM
These are the generations where divorce and multiple re-marriage is as normal as marriage. This is an obnoxious example of statistics being used to lie to people. Wait another 10 years and you'll see the massive spike.
(Score: 3, Touché) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday April 13 2016, @09:38PM
These are the generations where divorce and multiple re-marriage is as normal as marriage.
Wait, which generations?
The divorce rate peaked in the 70's/80's and has been decreasing for 20 years now. [nytimes.com]
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Thursday April 14 2016, @08:06AM
I stand corrected. Thanks for the new information.
(Score: 2) by bugamn on Friday April 15 2016, @01:45AM
I wish someone invented "+1 civil behavior" for those kinds of posts.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @12:50PM
Interesting study as far as mistaken and/or unintended cuckoldry. Given the *apparent* popularity of cuckold lifestyle, personal ad, and porn sites, it should have been easy to find a modern control group.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:04PM
Woody Allen and Ronan Farrow [dailymail.co.uk]?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:13PM
birth control and abortion mask the overall rate of cuckolding by women.
(Score: 3, Informative) by danmars on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:24PM
The term refers to raising another man's child without knowing it, not to cheating. Children that are never born are not raised by another father.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @01:36PM
Wrong. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cuckold [merriam-webster.com]
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday April 13 2016, @05:11PM
Clarification:
The study refers to raising another man's child without knowing it, not to cheating. Children that are never born are not raised by another father.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @02:15PM
</just sayin'>
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @02:25PM
Son, you need to stop wasting time here and get cracking on those CS lab assignments.
- your real dad
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @03:57PM
-your real dad....
...Dad, did you file those TPS reports yet?
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday April 13 2016, @05:13PM
Somehow this study is riling up the anti-feminists. I'm honestly curious as to why. Maybe because it seems to disprove victimization of men?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @05:23PM
Or perhaps suggests that while they're busy doing all-night coding marathons or playing RPG's their wives and girlfriends are getting what they need somewhere else?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @06:00PM
Not enough time on my hands to be a good little sex object for the cisgendered hunnies. Do not even know why I would be interested or what's in it for me.
(Score: 4, Touché) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday April 13 2016, @06:07PM
You can go ahead and use your normal account, Kurenai, we all know it's you.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday April 13 2016, @07:56PM
cisgendered hunnies stole a password?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 13 2016, @07:30PM
The dudes who hate women are the ones who are most likely to have had their woman cheat on them.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Wednesday April 13 2016, @02:37PM
I see little problems with the selection bias in this study too.
First it doesn't take into account the children that go unrecognized by the father, which do not carry the surname obviously, and for whom a deep ancestry tree is obviously not available.
Second it likely doesn't take into account the firstborns who are more likely to be genuinely from the father, less likely to end up as a friar in convent, and more likely to have a carefully arranged marriage, because they were destined to inherit.
Anyway, this is none of my business, really.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Thursday April 14 2016, @02:18AM
>a cuckoldry rate of less than 1 percent
1 percent is pretty high.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by legont on Thursday April 14 2016, @06:21AM
Women routinely ‘shop around’ for reserve males in extra-pair copulations. The whole idea is that if the primary male dies there are other males who believe the children are theirs and so will provide some protection. As per genes, they chose prime male for that. Therefore males should accept such a behaviour as most males do.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 14 2016, @08:11AM
there are other males who believe the children are theirs and so will provide some protection
Yeah, right, for looser males! This is why, whenever I, and super macho Lion male, take over a pride, I kill all the babies, or as the Jedi call them, "younglings". Don't want no DNA of a brother by another mother supping at my table, bro! Gansta style! Primogeniture! Prima Nocte! Aw, fuck, it's Latin so I can not grok the meaning, bros! Could you possible knock up my wife, so we could have some kids? She is starting to think I is shooting blanks! And she have even started to date Snow, on a trial basis, since his wife is either stupid, apathetic, or sterile. Don't want my bitch to go that way, no snow!