Body Count—The Death of Relationships

When a man asks a woman he’s dating, “What’s your body count?” he wants to know how many men she’s slept with. Often, the woman will refuse to answer. “It doesn’t matter.” But if it doesn’t matter, then why not answer the question?

Because it does matter. A lot. And women know it, deep down. That’s why they generally try to hide or minimize their sexual history from prospective dating partners.

Men have several good reasons to be wary of promiscuous women. Until the modern era, they expected their wives to be virgins. Virginity was the only way to guarantee paternity of a child. We now have DNA paternity tests, but they are a recent invention. A man’s desire for a chaste woman is likely biologically ingrained and expresses itself as disgust or revulsion at discovering that a woman has slept with a horde of men.

Men also want to minimize the risk that their girlfriend or wife will cheat on them. For women, the higher the body count, the higher the rate of infidelity. This is likely due to oxytocin burnout that comes from damaged pair bonding ability. Unlike men, women become quickly emotionally attached to their sexual partners as their bodies release oxytocin, a pair bonding hormone and neurotransmitter. The strength of the pair bond decreases as the number of partners increases. A weak pair bond increases the risk of cheating.

Although it may appear unfair to women, a man’s body count is far less important. It doesn’t correlate strongly with infidelity. On top of that, infidelity is much less of a concern for women, than it is for men. And there is good reason for this.