Intelligent men 'less likely to cheat'

It may not always hold true, but a new study says that intelligent men are less likely to cheat on their wives.

British researchers at the London School of Economics and Political Science have carried out the study and found that unfaithful men are less intelligent than their loyal counterparts because of evolution.

However, the study, based on an analysis of social trends, found no evidence that clever women are more likely to remain faithful than the general population.

As part of the study, the researchers analysed two major US surveys which ascertained the social attitudes and IQs of thousands of teenagers and adults. They found that men with higher IQs place greater value on monogamy and sexual exclusivity than their less intelligent peers

"As the empirical analysis shows, more intelligent men are more likely to value monogamy and sexual exclusivity than less intelligent men," 'The Daily Telegraph' newspaper quoted lead researcher Dr Satoshi Kanazawa as saying.

According to him, the correlation between intelligence and monogamy in men actually has its origins in evolutionary development. "Sexual exclusivity is an evolutionary novel quality that would have been of little benefit to early man, who was programmed to be promiscuous," he said.

Other "evolutionary novel" qualities that are more common among people of higher intelligence include liberalism and atheism, the study indicated.

The findings have been published in the latest edition of the 'Social Psychology Quarterly' journal.