And, frankly, how young is too young? On the wrong side of the cutoff are cases of year-olds being prosecuted for having sex with a high school sweetheart a couple of years their junior.
When Does a Big Age Gap in a Relationship Become Abuse?
Meanwhile, no legal system in the world forbids, say, a year-old from having sexual relations with a year-old intern coincidentally, the ages of Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky in As the tide of victims speaking out against sexual abuse continues to sweep the globe, it raises the question: How young is too young? Adolescent Development, Discrimination, and Consent Law. So how to resolve this paradox? I offer a solution — one based in math.
In short, the age of consent should not be an arbitrary, universal number, but should change according to the age of the oldest person in the relationship. Fumbling for your calculator? Simply put, pairing year-olds with year-olds, year-olds with year-olds and year-olds with year-olds is not OK. The idea of using a formula to calculate appropriate ages is not new. Of course, age is just a number, and basing laws upon that is somewhat arbitrary.
The idea comes from contract law: Contracts entered into by children can be voided at any time. Regardless of whether legislators will be convinced by my formula, perhaps it could cause a little pause for thought in the bedroom.
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Close Search Hey what are you looking for? Buss and Schmitt provided a Sexual Strategies Theory that describes the two sexes as having evolved distinct psychological mechanisms that underlie the strategies for short- and long-term mating. This theory is directly relevant and compatible with those two already mentioned, Life History and Parental Investment.
As they are the higher-investing sex, females tend to be slightly more demanding when picking a mate as predicted by parental investment theory. In contrast to above, in short-term mating, females will tend to favour males that demonstrate physical attractiveness, as this displays cues of 'good genes'. Cross-culturally, research has consistently supported the trend in which males prefer to mate with younger females, and females with older males.
Analysing the results further, cross culturally, the average age females prefer to marry is Males however prefer to marry when they are The results from the study therefore show that the mean preferred marriage age difference 3. The preferred age of females is However, in some regions of the world there is a substantially larger age gap between marriage partners in that males are much older than their wife or wives. A theory that can explain this finding from an evolutionary perspective is the parasite-stress theory which explains that an increase of infectious disease can cause humans to evolve selectively according to these pressures.
Evidence also shows that as disease risk gets higher, it puts a level of stress on mating selection and increases the use of polygamy. Table 2 shows that 17 of the 20 countries with the largest age-gaps between spouses practice polygyny , and that males range from 6.
In regions such as Sub-Saharan Africa the use of polygyny is commonly practiced as a consequence of high sex-ratios more males born per females and passing on heterozygous diverse genetics from different females to offspring. Another reason that polygynous communities have larger age-gaps between spouses is that intrasexual competition for females increases as fewer females remain on the marriage market with males having more than one wife each , therefore the competitive advantage values younger females due to their higher reproductive value.
Comparatively in Western societies such as the US and Europe, there is a trend of smaller age-gaps between spouses, reaching its peak average in Southern Europe of 3. Using the same pathogen-stress model, there is a lower prevalence of disease in these economically developed areas, and therefore a reduced stress on reproduction for survival. Additionally, it is common to see monogamous relationships widely in more modern societies as there are more women in the marriage market and polygamy is illegal throughout most of Europe and the United States.
As access to education increases worldwide, the age of marriage increases with it, with more of the youth staying in education for longer. The mean age of marriage in Europe is well above 25, and averaging at 30 in Nordic countries, however this may also be due to the increase of cohabitation in European countries.
Social structural origin theory argues that the underlying cause of sex-differentiated behaviour is the concentration of men and women in differing roles in society.
6 things you'll only know if you're in an age-gap relationship - Telegraph
It has been argued that a reason gender roles are so prevalent in society is that the expectations of gender roles can become internalised in a person's self-concept and personality. It is thought that a trade-off or equilibrium is reached in regards to what each gender brings to the mating partnership and that this equilibrium is most likely to be reached with a trade-off of ages when selecting a mate.
Women and men tend to seek a partner that will fit in with their society's sexual division of labour.
For example, a marital system based on males being the provider and females the domestic worker, favours an age gap in the relationship. An older male is more likely to have more resources to provide to the family. The rational choice model also suggests that people look for partners who can provide for them in their life bread-winners ; as men traditionally earn more as they get older, women will therefore prefer older men. Age-hypogamy defines a relationship where the woman is the older partner, the opposite of this being age- hypergamy.
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Older female—younger male relationships are, relative to age-hypergamous relationships older male—younger female , less researched in scientific literature. The picture often displays a stereotypical pairing of a divorced, middle-aged, white, affluent female dating a younger male with the relationship taking the form of a non-commitment arrangement between the partners. Although age-hypogenous relationships have historically been very infrequent, recent US census data has shown an increase in age-hypogenous relationships from 6.
There may be many reasons why age-hypogamous relationships are not very frequent. Sexual double standards in society, in particular, may account for their rarity. There is debate in the literature as to what determines age-hypogamy in sexual relationships. A number of variables have been argued to influence the likelihood of women entering into an age-hypogamous relationship, such as racial or ethnic background, level of education, income, marital status, conservatism, age, and number of sexual partners. Another example illustrating the varying literature surrounding age-hypogamous relationships is research indicating that a woman's marital status can influence her likelihood of engaging in age-hypogamous relationships.
It has been found that married women are less likely to be partnered with a younger male compared to non-married women [60] in comparison to more recent findings, which provides evidence to suggest that previously married women are more likely to engage in an age-hypogamous sexual relationship compared to women who are married or who have never been married.
Despite social views depicting age-hypogamous relationships as short lived and fickle, recent research published by Psychology of Women Quarterly has found that women in age-hypogamous relationships are more satisfied and the most committed in their relationships compared to younger women or similarly aged partners. A recent study found that when shown pictures of women of ages ranging from 20—45 with different levels of attractiveness, regardless of age, males chose the more attractive individuals as long term partners. The "never date anyone under half your age plus seven" rule is a rule of thumb sometimes used to prejudge whether an age difference is socially acceptable.
In earlier sources, the rule had a different interpretation than in contemporary culture, as it was understood as a formula to calculate ideal age for the bride, instead of a lower limit for the suitable age. The half-your-age-plus seven rule also appears in John Fox, Jr. In modern times, this rule has been criticised as being more accurate for men than women, and for allowing a greater maximum age for a woman's partner later in her life than is actually socially acceptable.
The age disparity between two partners is typically met with some disdain in industrialized nations, and various derogatory terms for participants have arisen in the vernacular. In English-speaking countries, where financial disparity, and an implicit money-for-companionship exchange, is perceived as central to the relationship, the elder of the two partners perceived as the richer is often called a "sugar daddy" or "sugar mama" depending on gender. The younger of the two is similarly called the sugar baby.
In extreme cases, a person who marries into an extremely wealthy family can be labelled a gold digger , especially in cases where the wealthy partner is of extreme age or poor health; this term often describes women but can be applied to either gender. An attractive younger woman pursued by a wealthy man who is perceived as wanting her only for her looks may be called a trophy wife. In the latter case, the term trophy is broadened to include any substantial difference in power originating from physical looks, wealth, or status.
It should be noted that the trophy label is often perceived as objectifying the partner, with or without the partner's implicit consent. Where the primary perceived reason for a relationship with a significant age difference is sexual, many gender-specific terms have become popular in English-speaking cultures. A woman of middle to elderly age who pursues younger men is a cougar or puma , and a man in a relationship with an older woman is often called a boytoy , toyboy , himbo , or cub.
In reverse, the terms rhino , trout and manther a play on the panther term for women are generally used to label an older man pursuing younger women, and the younger woman in such a relationship may be called a kitten or panther.
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If the much-younger target of affections is not of the legal age of consent, the term jailbait may be applied to them, with connotations cautioning against involvement. An older term for any licentious or lascivious man is a lecher , and that term and its shortening of lech have become common to describe an elderly man who makes passes at much younger women.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The neutrality of this section is disputed. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until conditions to do so are met. September Learn how and when to remove this template message. Australian Bureau of Statistics. Retrieved 27 December Office for National Statistics.
Retrieved 7 May Kenneth; Santtila, Pekka Retrieved 25 November Retrieved 11 September Variations among Developing Countries". International Family Planning Perspectives. The Great Books of the Western World. Journal of Sex Research. Parental investment and sexual selection. Current Directions in Psychological Science. Evolutionary hypotheses tested in 37 cultures".
Behavioral and Brain Sciences. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. A critical review of theory and research".