Is singlehood different for men?

How evolutionary theory can help explain sex differences in singlehood experiences

This is another in my series of guest posts by Oxford Handbook of Singlehood authors. Today’s post is by evolutionary psychology graduate student Immy Harrison.

- Geoff

Two years ago, I began my PhD research on the relationship between singlehood and mental health. Like most research projects, this started with a trawl through the existing literature. I read almost anything that linked singlehood to mental health outcomes, be it positive or negative (it was almost always negative).

Photo by Austin Mabe on Unsplash

Considering how differently male and female singlehood are discussed culturally, I was surprised by how rarely the mental health of single men and women were compared. It led me to question how different the experience of singlehood really is for men and women. That is until I expanded my search beyond mental health outcomes (e.g., depression, anxiety) to consider wellbeing more broadly (e.g., loneliness, life satisfaction) and came across the viral “Sisters are doin’ it for themselves” study.

The headline finding of the paper was that single women were more satisfied with their singlehood, and reported less desire for a romantic partner, than single men. This finding has now been shown to have some cross-cultural support. If single men are genuinely less happy about their singlehood, even a modest sex difference could become socially significant as the number of single people grows.

With rising rates of singlehood, we have seen the emergence of harmful ideological groups like the incel and MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way) movements. These have drawn notable media attention and led people, including myself, to consider the impact of singlehood on men. Attempting to understand why single men report less satisfaction with their singlehood is something Andrew Thomas, Will Costello and I explore in more detail in our chapter (Single Men) in the Oxford Handbook of Singlehood. At the very heart of our chapter, and this post, is the question: How is singlehood different for men?

Evolutionary psychology and the origin of sex differences

When meaningful differences are found between men and women, cultural explanations often focus on the role of socialisation, that is, the impact of societal expectations around gender roles internalised from childhood. However, when a sex difference replicates consistently across cultures (even more so when these cultures have varying norms around gender and equality), explanations require a wider lens.

Modern social science models are increasingly acknowledging the benefits of an evolutionary-integrated approach where evolutionary explanations don’t replace cultural ones, but contribute to a fuller understanding of how behaviours develop. So rather than a blank slate, we have evolved psychological predispositions that provide a starting point which then interacts with the culture around us. This is why we often see sex differences in the same direction in every culture, though to slightly varying degrees.

Evolutionary psychology is the study of this evolved starting point, making predictions as to how human behaviour and cognition may have been shaped by survival and reproductive pressures over the course of human history. It explains sex differences as the result of men and women facing different challenges over long periods of evolutionary time. For example, women developed breasts that produce milk because women could get pregnant, men could not get pregnant and therefore had no need to develop milk producing breasts. Evolutionary psychologists extend this logic beyond sex differences in anatomy, asking how men and women may also have evolved tendencies towards different preferences and behaviours.

Throughout most of human history, sexual intercourse carried very different consequences for men and women. A man could, theoretically, father a child through the effort of a single sexual encounter. Whilst for a woman, that same sexual encounter (prior to modern contraceptive and breastfeeding technology) could result in 9 months of pregnancy, the risks of childbirth, and years of infant care. Evolutionary psychologists refer to this as a difference in ‘obligatory parental investment’.

This difference in the costliness of sexual intercourse is an important starting point because it meant men and women repeatedly faced different challenges when it came to reproduction. In the face of these challenges, behaviours and tendencies that helped people leave more surviving descendants would have become more common. And if a particular tendency consistently led to better reproductive outcomes for men, but not women, we might expect men on average to display more of this behaviour. Similarly, if a tendency benefited women’s reproductive success more than men’s, we would expect the reverse.

An example of this might be why men consistently report more interest in casual sex than women. Throughout human history, if you take into account pregnancy and childcare, the maximum number of children a woman could have a year was one. Men were far less biologically restricted. A man who successfully slept around had the potential to father far more children than a man who remained with a single partner. Because an inclination towards pursuing multiple partners would have benefited men’s reproductive success, but not women’s, and there was a genetic contribution to that behaviour, it makes sense that we see a sex difference in attitudes towards casual sex.

Having children isn’t enough for genes to flourish in the human gene pool. Those children have to go on to survive, grow up, and reproduce themselves. A man who pursued multiple partners, fathered many children, but did little to help them survive beyond infancy could end up with far fewer grandchildren than a man who had the same partner but helped raise all of his children to adulthood. Long-term pair bonds had their reproductive advantages. For this reason, evolutionary psychologists can acknowledge that humans have evolved a repertoire of ‘sexual strategies’. That is, both men and women are capable of long-term relationships and short-term sex – men are just more open to engaging in short-term sex because in the past it had its reproductive benefits.

Men’s openness to engaging in casual sex creates another significant difference in men and women’s experience of the mating domain. As men are more willing to engage in casual sex they tend to have lower standards for casual sex partners. This means (at least on a short-term basis) sexual intercourse, and with it the ability to reproduce, is more accessible for women than men. Indeed, genetic evidence shows that throughout human history there was a notable difference in the proportion of men, compared to women, who were able to pass on their genes each generation. From an evolutionary perspective this is important because prolonged failure to find a mate would have had negative reproductive consequences, and men, more so than women, would have experienced this challenge. It is possible that negative emotions, specific to failure in the mating domain, evolved partly to motivate individuals to change their circumstances, and improve their chances of reproduction.

This evolutionary perspective can lead us to make predictions about singlehood that models informed exclusively by social theories wouldn’t. That is, that men who can get casual sex might want to be single, (a short-term strategy that is paying off), and that men who feel disempowered to initiate relationships (a signal that you may be approaching an evolutionary dead-end) will be more distressed.

The pursuit of sexual freedom

Some men choose to be single voluntarily, and for them freedom is often seen as an important benefit to singlehood. In fact, freedom has been found to be rated more highly among single men than women, particularly sexual freedom.

Evolutionary explanations for why men tend to be more open to casual sex and a variety of partners can also shed light on why men may be more likely to choose singlehood, in the hopes of making the most of the sexual freedom it offers. This decision makes particular sense when you consider the modern dating environment and the fact a short-term strategy has never been so easy to pursue.

In ancestral times the dating pool likely stretched as far as neighbouring tribes, with 150 suggested as the maximum number of people humans in the past would have been able to maintain social relationships with. Modern dating environments differ dramatically: There are currently around 190,000 active profiles on Tinder in London alone. Online dating has expanded access to potential partners on a monumental scale. Meaning, for some men, sexual variety is more achievable than ever before.

The movement of more and more dating online, and away from school, university, the workplace, and friends-of-friends, has also meant increasing anonymity. In the ancestral past, behaviour in courtships and long-term partnerships could have been monitored by relatives, neighbours, and friends, with your reputation at risk over any misconduct. In modern cities, with hundreds of thousands of active users, and few dating apps requiring a comprehensive background check, people are now free to participate in one-off sexual encounters with virtual strangers. The social obligation to pursue anything further has been removed, making it easier than ever for some men to engage in casual sex.

The way online dating can facilitate casual sex and create access to such a variety of partners has created the appearance (in some cases the illusion) that a short-term strategy may be more achievable than ever before. More men deciding to opt out of relationships, in favour of sexual freedom, to make the most of today’s evolutionarily novel dating environment, could explain part of the rise in male singlehood.

Why are there more involuntarily single men?

Whilst the movement of modern dating online may have encouraged some men to opt out of relationships to pursue more short-term sexual success, both wellbeing studies and demographic surveys alike find that single men, more than women, are actively dating and hoping to find a romantic partner. If single men are reporting considerable interest in being in a relationship, why are there more single men than ever before?

One explanation is a mismatch between women’s evolved mate preferences and their mounting socioeconomic success. Evolutionary psychology argues that we have evolved preferences for certain traits in partners that would have been beneficial for the survival of offspring. For example, both men and women tend to value cooperativeness, dependability and health in a partner which would have been important for the successful raising of children.

Sex differences also exist in these preferences with women prioritising some traits more than men, and vice versa. One of the most consistent findings is that women, on average, place a higher value on traits linked to status and financial stability. This is because ancestral women who chose partners that were willing and able to provide for them were more likely to have children who survived to reproduce. Interestingly, this preference does not disappear in societies with higher levels of gender equality. In some cases, the preference is found to be even stronger among economically successful women.

This presents a bit of a challenge when combined with the evidence that women are now outperforming men in higher education and some workplaces. The narrower pool of men who meet the criteria of wealthier and/or better educated, is resulting in more women choosing to delay finding a partner and more men feeling excluded from dating.

In theory this leaves both men and women in a difficult position. So why are single men less satisfied with their singlehood?

The evolutionary alarm bell

An important predictor of how single people experience singlehood is how possible they believe finding a partner is for them. The mismatch in the current dating pool may leave both men and women feeling dejected about their long-term partner prospects. However, because of the sex differences in attitudes towards casual sex and the uneven distribution of access to casual sex, some men may not only feel uncertain about their ability to find a long-term partner, but also their ability to attract any romantic or sexual interest at all.

This distinction may explain why some men appear to struggle more with singlehood than women. Because singlehood for men, unlike women, means greater uncertainty around their sexual success. If male singlehood is more closely tied to reproductive uncertainty, then we might expect the motivational system (where negative emotions exist to encourage a person to improve their chances of finding a partner) to be triggered by the experience of involuntary singlehood in men. When singlehood is involuntary, this system could lead to the experience of recurring negative emotions that contribute to poorer well-being, if not more serious mental health consequences – this can be referred to as dysphoric singlehood. It may even explain why the feeling of ‘failure in mating’ is one of the two strongest correlates of male suicidal ideation.

Evolutionary explanations as reassuring

Returning to the question of how singlehood is different for men, evolutionary perspectives can offer insight into why the movement of dating online may be encouraging more single men to pursue more short-term sexual experiences, why imbalances in the current dating pool are leaving more men involuntarily single, and why involuntary singlehood may produce particularly negative experiences for single men.

This does not mean that singlehood is inherently miserable. Some people flourish while single. Others experience singlehood as expansive and deeply fulfilling. Understanding what predicts those outcomes, and how wellbeing can be improved for people who are struggling, is an enormously worthwhile area of research.

At the same time, I think evolutionary explanations can sometimes be comforting. They remind us that uncomfortable emotions are not personal failures, but understandable responses. If we had evolved no desire for sex or partnership, the human race would cease to exist. To sometimes want a partner is not just social conditioning nor is it evidence of a need for self-improvement.

Evolutionary perspectives make negative feelings about singlehood more understandable. It is in understanding them that we might be able to better manage them, both as individuals and as a society.