What Is an Affair?
For many couples, greater emotional connectivity coincides with the placing of limits on outside relationships and, more specifically, a commitment to sexual exclusivity. Although genital contact with others is usually off limits, some couples renegotiate this agreement if, for example, one partner becomes seriously ill. There are also cultural variations in these patterns; some cultures, for example, tolerate, if not encourage, men to seek sexual partners outside the marital relationship as a measure of manhood. Finally, other couples may agree to an “open” marital relationship that acknowledges and allow for affairs outside the primary relationship. Given the increased risk for contracting incurable sexually transmitted diseases (for example, genital herpes or HIV disease) in today’s world, however, there is probably less flexibility around this issue now than there was perhaps 20 years ago. For our purposes, an affair may be defined as an emotionally or sexually intimate relationshi