I'm very grateful to all the people who have shared their personal experiences in dealing with affairs over the past 28 years. It is through their stories that I came to see how much we have misunderstood what's involved in preventing affairs.

I want to acknowledge a special debt of gratitude to Diane Sollee, Director, Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples Education (SmartMarriages). In addition to her personal and professional support for all my work, I particularly appreciate her help in getting out the word about my Survey Questionnaire on Preventing Affairs. Sending a notice to her listserv allowed me to reach a larger and more diverse audience than would have been possible without her help.

This book is written specifically for those couples who have not faced the issue of affairs—and want to prevent ever having to face it. You CAN have a monogamous marriage, but not by just assuming you're immune. Having a long-term monogamous marriage requires knowing what's involved in preventing affairs—and acting on that knowledge on an ongoing basis as a couple.

I've spent many years working to help couples recover from affairs, and I realize that one of the reasons they failed to prevent the affairs in the first place was that they had just assumed they would be monogamous. Since they never considered they might be vulnerable, they didn't actively work at preventing affairs—or even recognize it as an issue that needed to be discussed.

Although you may have every intention of being monogamous and no idea of becoming involved in an extramarital affair, that doesn't make you (or your spouse) immune; in fact, no one is immune.

Here's the way I described the situation in The Monogamy Myth.

"No one is immune from having affairs disrupt their lives or the lives of those they care about; they happen to all kinds of people, in all walks of life."

When I first wrote those words in 1989, many people still held the false idea that 'bad people have affairs and good people don't.' But through the years, the public is coming to recognize that affairs also happen to good people in good marriages.

In fact, couples may be even more vulnerable to affairs when they hold the attitude that "an affair could never happen in our marriage." This has been the experience of many couples who felt good about their marriages (often being the envy of their friends), then discovered too late that no marriage is immune.

There's a great deal of denial and rationalization when it comes to focusing directly on the issue of affairs. So it's a 'tough sell' to get couples to see that they can't just assume monogamy. Assuming monogamy is one of many false beliefs (myths) that make up 'the monogamy myth.' Unfortunately, this myth has not changed during the years since I first wrote about it.

For instance, I recently spoke to a woman who was newly married, and I asked her what kind of discussions she and her husband had about preventing affairs. She made a typical response: "We didn't talk about it; we just assume we'll be monogamous!"

One of the reasons so many people assume monogamy is because they think affairs happen only in a few marriages. People will say, "Well, I don't know anyone who has had an affair." My response is, "Yes, you do know people who've had affairs; they just kept it secret and never told you about it."

You're likely to learn of an affair only if it leads to divorce; however, the majority of couples stay together, often keeping the experience secret from friends and family. This secrecy creates a distorted view of the prevalence of affairs—because we tend to think that the few affairs that are disclosed are the only ones that happen.

The Prevalence of Affairs

The reason it's important for people to understand the prevalence of affairs is that without that understanding they have a false sense of security. And thinking they're not vulnerable makes it less likely they will put forth the necessary effort to prevent affairs.

Since so many people are desperate for evidence that affairs are not a big threat to them personally, they want to believe that affairs are not prevalent—and they gravitate toward any survey or study that provides some reassurance

For instance, one prominent study a few years ago reported that only 25% of people have affairs. This is questionable due to the fact that statistics were higher than that way back in the 40s and 50s with the famous Kinsey studies. His samples included 5,000 men and showed that by age 40, 50 percent of the men had experienced extramarital sexual intercourse. And Kinsey's original samples of 6,000 women showed that by age 40, 26 percent of the women had experienced extramarital sexual intercourse. Anyone who thinks there has been no increase in affairs during the past half-century is living in a dream world.

Definition of an Affair

One of the reasons it's so difficult to establish an accurate measurement of the prevalence of affairs is that respondents to surveys often filter their responses through their own denial and rationalization about this issue. For instance, many people will report that they haven't had an affair based on their personal 'definition' of an affair. They may consider a one-night stand or a brief fling while out of town or a massage that includes sexual aspects or paid sex of any kind not to be an affair. Likewise, many people consider an 'online affair' or an 'emotional affair' not to be an affair. And they bring these personal interpretations to their responses to the surveys that ask about having an affair.

Before going any further in discussing how to prevent affairs, it's important to establish just what constitutes an affair. Here's a working definition:

    Any outside relationship with a sexual or an emotional connection that is kept secret     from the spouse is a threat to the marriage and can legitimately be defined as 'an affair.'

The Importance of Monogamy

There is evidence that monogamy is a very important issue for couples, as reflected in a 2007 report from the nonprofit Pew Research Center. The results of their interviews of 2,020 American adults showed that the top factor (seen as most important to success in marriage) was 'faithfulness,' chosen by 93% of those interviewed.

So if preventing affairs is viewed as the most important factor in marital success, it warrants making a major effort to be as informed and active as possible—despite the confusing statistics that make it difficult to know precisely how many affairs are happening.

However, regardless of the particular statistics as to how many men have affairs and how many women have affairs—those having affairs are not all married to each other. So the total number of marriages affected by affairs is necessarily larger than the numbers of either men or women having affairs.

In trying to get people to focus on the prevalence of affairs, I feel somewhat like a 'voice in the wilderness' or the only one saying "The Emperor has no clothes." But this awareness is essential if we are to help people prevent affairs—and to recover if it happens. It's only by recognizing the prevalence of affairs that couples will be adequately alerted to the need to take positive steps to achieve their hopes for a long-term monogamous marriage. I hope this book will be helpful in making this possible for more couples.

Survey on Preventing Affairs

In preparation for writing this book, I conducted a Survey to get a clearer understanding of the most commonly-held attitudes and beliefs about prevention. In order to help people be more effective in preventing affairs, I felt a need to know where they were starting from.

I listed 16 items and asked people to choose the 5 that they thought were most likely to be effective in preventing affairs. (They could also add to the list by checking "other" and specifying what they would like to add to the list.)

Since attitudes about prevention are often determined by a number of very personal factors, I began the survey by asking people to identify themselves on three characteristics: gender, marital status, and personal experience in dealing with affairs.

Below is a breakdown of the respondents:

   Total Responses: 755
       Gender:
          575 women
          180 men
       Marital Status:
          728 married
           27 single
       Personal Experience with Affairs:
          552 yes
          203 no

Results of the Survey

The results of this survey do not necessarily reflect the actual relative importance of the factors most effective in preventing affairs, only which are the most commonly-held beliefs about which factors are most important. However, I did a careful count of the responses and provide a detailed list of the Rankings of all 16 items, with percentages choosing each item. (See Appendix II for the full breakdown of percentages and rankings.)

Appendix II also includes breakdowns by subcategories, including:
    —differences between women and men
    —differences between those who are married and those who are single
    —differences between those who have had personal experience in dealing with affairs
        and those who have not had personal experience with this issue.

The significance of the items is better understood by focusing on these breakdowns than by looking at the overall rankings. In fact, these breakdowns provide the most important information to be gained from the survey results.

Note that all the data from the survey are included in the four Appendices at the end of the book:
    Appendix I: A copy of the Questionnaire and overview of responses
    Appendix II: Rankings of all the responses to the Questionnaire
    Appendix III: Detailed breakdown of the responses to the 16 items
    Appendix IV: Additional items submitted by the respondents