Though monogamy is arguably the social norm in our society, a recent study says many married people cheat for a variety of reasons.

The National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago published a survey this year claiming that 12 percent of women cheat, while 22 percent of men cheat.

According to “Today” show contributor Dr. Gail Saltz, a psychiatrist with New York Presbyterian Hospital, statistics on how many men cheat are hard to come by because most men do not want to come clean on this subject. Saltz said figures range from 22 percent to as much as 70 percent.

“It seems that every study has a different set of numbers on cheating, but the one consistent thing is men cheat more than women by almost two to one,” Saltz said. “Any way you cut it, many men are straying from monogamy.”

University of Wisconsin sociology professor John Delamater said the statistics in the study seem consistent. Delamater said informal surveys among students at UW revealed similar statistics in the past.

Many studies show men to be more sexually motivated to have an affair than are women, while women appear to be more emotionally motivated.

“Men are motivated by a desire for sexually experimenting and for having the rush of ‘new sex’,” Saltz said. “However, many women mistakenly believe [their husband’s] mistress must be more attractive than she. It seems to be the wish for newness and variety, as well as the particular man’s psychological needs and vulnerabilities that is more the motivator.”

Delamater said women talk about looking for companionship and emotional relationships while men tend to look for sex in relationships. He also said women often claim to be sexually satisfied in their relationships, while men complain about not enough sex.

The classic mid-life crisis may also be a contributing factor to men seeking extra-marital affairs.

“Many men strike up an affair when they start to feel the fear and loss that comes with aging,” Saltz said. “To run from the terror that they are not so young and invulnerable, they have an affair to deny the aging [process].”

Delamater said men in mid-life crisis may respond in this way, but it is neither their only way of dealing nor only men who engage in this type of aging-related behavior.

Saltz also said that some biologists believe men are motivated to cheat by a Darwinian instinct to spread their genetic seed to more mates, whereas women would want one mate in order to get protection and support.

Delamater noted that there is no biological reason for men cheating as a response to aging.

“Men’s sex drive peaks at ages eighteen to twenty-one, while women’s often peak through their thirties,” Delamater said. “It is much more psychological in nature.”

UW senior and psychology major Noelle Pontarelli also feels that men may cheat with younger women based on an animal instinct to reproduce.

“Assuming there exists a biological motivation for males to seek reproductive opportunities, younger women would be more desirable, as they are considered more reproductively successful,” Pontarelli said.

In reference to women’s reasons for cheating, Saltz and Delamater both agreed that emotional factors are dominant.

“Women are looking for communication and emotional intimacy in the new bond,” Saltz said. “They want to talk to someone who makes them feel important, cared for, secure and understood.”

Both Saltz and Delamater said relationships can recover from cheating, but this entirely depends on the strength of the relationship and the nature of the affair. Saltz said men are less forgiving of cheating wives than wives are of cheating husbands, and only about a third of marriages survive affairs.