Thou Shalt Not Covet: The Psychology of Admiration Drift and Infidelity
Thursday February 12, 2026.
There is a famous line from Esther Perel that I have long admired.
When speaking about infidelity, she notes that the Judeo-Christian tradition offers not one but two commandments against it:
The sixth commandment; Thou shalt not commit adultery.
and the ninth commandment; Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s spouse.
One forbids the act.
The other forbids the thought.
It is a psychologically sophisticated distinction.
And modern research is now studying what the ancients already understood.
The Study — Dissatisfaction, Sociosexuality, and Male Infidelity Intentions
A recent study published in Sexual and Relationship Therapy examined 246 Romanian adults and found that men who reported lower relationship satisfaction also reported higher sociosexuality — meaning greater openness to casual, uncommitted sex — which in turn predicted stronger intentions toward infidelity.
In statistical terms, sociosexuality mediated the link between dissatisfaction and cheating intentions for men.
For women in this sample, that mediation pathway did not hold.
Translated:
When some men become dissatisfied, their openness to sexual novelty increases — and that increase predicts greater willingness to cheat.
Not behavior.
Intentions.
But intentions are rehearsals.
This study is not really about adultery.
It is about coveting.
Admiration Drift
Infidelity does not begin with skin.
It begins with comparison.
When dissatisfaction enters a relationship, something subtle can occur. Attention migrates. Admiration drifts. The imagination begins scanning outward.
I call this admiration drift — the gradual relocation of esteem and erotic curiosity away from the committed partner and toward imagined alternatives.
Sociosexuality — the trait reflecting comfort with sex outside commitment — can lower internal resistance to that drift. If novelty already carries little moral friction for a person, dissatisfaction can function as permission.
But dissatisfaction alone does not cause betrayal.
The mechanism is admiration displacement.
When admiration relocates outside the partnership, loyalty weakens long before any physical boundary is crossed.
That is coveting.
And it is cognitive before it is sexual.
Why the Ninth Commandment Is Harder than the Sixth
The sixth commandment, forbidding adultery requires opportunity.
The ninth commandment prohibiting even thinking about it because coveting requires imagination.
And imagination is constant in the human condition.
We live in a culture saturated with comparison: swipe apps, algorithmic exposure, curated desirability, infinite sexual availability.
For a man high in sociosexuality and low in satisfaction, this environment amplifies temptation.
The ancient prohibition against coveting was not prudish.
It was neurologically perceptive.
The mind rehearses before the body acts.
Modern modeling techniques are simply measuring what moral traditions already intuited.
A Necessary Caution
We must not caricature male sexuality.
High sociosexuality is not pathology. It is a dispositional variable. Many high-sociosexual life partners remain faithful by conviction and structure.
Nor does this study claim women do not cheat. It suggests only that, in this sample, dissatisfaction did not statistically increase women’s sociosexual openness in the same way.
Infidelity pathways may differ by gender, culture, age, and context.
And this was a young Romanian sample relying on self-report. The study cannot establish causality.
Still, the pattern is instructive.
When dissatisfaction and novelty-orientation converge, the internal risk curve changes.
The Clinical Moment That Matters
In my experience, the infidelity process rarely begins with lust.
It begins when dissatisfaction is narrated alongside idealized alternatives.
When a man begins saying, “I just don’t feel fulfilled,” while simultaneously entertaining flattering comparisons, the shift has already begun.
That shift is not sexual.
It is attentional.
The question is not, “Will he cheat?”
The better question is, “Where is his admiration going?”
Erotic tension and longing for novelty are real forces in long-term bonds. But unmanaged admiration erodes trust faster than boredom ever will.
The ability to govern admiration is a mature capacity, not a repressive one.
Monogamy is not sustained by prohibition alone.
It is sustained by disciplined admiration — especially when dissatisfaction tempts the imagination elsewhere.
The Counterweight
The modern conversation about infidelity often centers on whether monogamy is too restrictive, too unrealistic, too brittle for contemporary desire.
There is truth in acknowledging erotic complexity.
But there is another frame.
The problem is not monogamy’s impossibility.
The problem is undisciplined admiration.
If admiration is not deliberately reinvested in the partner during seasons of dissatisfaction, it will migrate.
Sociosexuality may make migration easier.
Dissatisfaction may make it rational.
But coveting is still a choice repeated quietly.
The Larger Lesson
Infidelity does not begin in a hotel room.
It begins in a story someone tells themselves.
It begins when dissatisfaction becomes justification and admiration becomes comparative.
The second commandment understood this long before psychology gave it a scale.
If we want to reduce infidelity, we must treat dissatisfaction early — and we must teach couples how to discipline admiration.
Because once admiration drifts, restraint thins.
And once restraint thins, intention becomes rehearsal.
Monogamy is not sustained by fear of adultery.
It is sustained by disciplined admiration.
That is not moralism.
It is structure.
And structure — not passion alone — is what endures.
Be Well, Stay Kind, and Godspeed.
REFERENCES:
Pricope, P., Huțul, T.-D., Karner-Huțuleac, A., & Huțul, A. (2024). The roles of sociosexuality and gender in the relationship between relationship satisfaction and intentions toward infidelity: A moderated mediation model. Sexual and Relationship Therapy. Advance online publication.