When Are People Most Likely to Cheat?
Cheating is rampant in our society today. Glorified in popular culture and encouraged by dating sites created for the unfaithful, cheating has become increasingly common, or perhaps, increasingly reported. Whether you have been cheated on, or if you have been the cheater yourself, infidelity continues to be one of the most harmful occurrences in the modern day relationship. We continue to ask ourselves questions such as, “why do people cheat”? “Who is more likely to cheat?” “What are the telltale signs of a cheater?” One of the increasingly popular questions has become, “when are people most likely to cheat?”
Recent studies that have charted the frequency of cheating occurrences have indicated that March is the month that someone is not only more likely to get divorced, but is more likely to cheat as well. Another commonly reported time period are the weeks directly following the Christmas holidays. Whether these occurrences are due to the weather, or to the holidays ending, or due to new years resolutions to “try new things”, many reports indicate that these are times when you should be more concerned about infidelity within your relationships.
Interestingly, February 13th has been deemed National Cheat Day, otherwise known as National Mistress Day. Prior to Valentine’s Day, the day couples would typically spend doting on each other, National Cheat Day is the day that many unfaithful men spend doting on their mistress or their side relationships. This is also one of the most popular days of the year for short bookings at hotels, motels and other travel accommodations.
If you are not one to believe in time patterns, there are other time-sensitive signs that may indicate that your partner is more likely to cheat. For example:
- Someone is more likely to cheat during extremely stressful periods of their life (i.e., a new house, a job promotion, a death in the family, etc.);
- A man is more likely to cheat on their married partner and have an affair when they are between the ages of 60 and 79 years;
- A woman is more likely to cheat on their partner between the ages of 28 and 37;
- Someone is more likely to cheat on their partner during the late hours of the night following a social event or in the afternoons when the unsuspecting partner is away at work;
- Someone is more likely to cheat when they have been in a relationship with their partner for seven years (i.e. the seven-year itch).
If you find that you are asking yourself questions such as these and are concerned about the security of your current relationship, you are not alone. We continue to study cheating, it’s patterns and explanations for cheating because it continues to affect millions of people around the world and will continue to do so in the time to come.
