Even fathers with only one wife provided no [longevity] benefit to their grandchildren, a finding supported by previous research.
That is based on a study of Finnish church data from the 18th and 19th centuries. The thrust of the entire piece is the claim that polygamous men will live longer than monogamous men. But note, all you Lotharios out there, this result is correlated with actual [multiple] marriage, not running around in bars and the like.
I just sent a copy of the article to my wife; she informed me that my taking a second wife would dramatically shorten my lifespan.
That aside, I wonder if the authors of the study adjusted for selection bias. I would think that healthier, more alert men would have an easier time getting more wives, and would be more likely to have the income to afford more.
I think I’d just have more to live for if I had a bevy of wives.
Erm, in a polygamous society it’s the alpha males that get all the wives. The beta males get no wives at all.
http://www.eqsq.com/vivreladifference/2008/08/23/polygamy-makes-men-live-longer/
Alpha males live longer than betas? That’s not really a noteworthy finding, is it?
Reading the article more closely, it does not say that polygamous men live longer than monogamous men. It merely says that men who live in polygamous societies live longer than men who live in monogamous societies. There is no individual tracking of men to count how many wives they have, nor would it even be possible to do so on a global scale.
It’s not clear who gets the greater longevity benefit in polygamous societies. It may be the polygamous alpha males, because they monopolize the women and are well cared for, or perhaps simply because they were rich and powerful to being with. But conceivably “non-ogamous” beta males in a polygamous society, especially in a subsistence economy, might benefit by being free of the hardships of supporting a wife and children. They could work less hard and live a more relaxed and hedonistic lifestyle; or conversely, they might be strongly motivated towards self-improvement and remaining fit in the hope of getting a wife, rather than getting paunchy and going to seed as many married men do.
It is highly probable that men with multiple wives live longer than comparable men with one wife, on average, given that women would disproportionately choose fitter men, and that such men would also benefit physically and psychologically from the arrangement. (Lots of evidence shows that we are disproportionally descended from such polygynous men)
But it is certainly not plausible that polygynous nations have people with longer average lifespans. We can easily mentally compare the lifespans in the Middle-East and Africa with Northern Asia and Europe in our heads. Any “control” for economic development is more than a little dubious.
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