Why Did Humans Become Monogamous?

Why did humans turn to monogamy? What led humans to decide to have sexual relations with only one person, unlike other animals? Ethics? Religion? Love? But the answer is none of these. According to a report by AFP, a group of researchers claims that what led humans to monogamy was neither love nor morality. Instead, fear of germs, bacteria, and sexually transmitted diseases has caused humans to limit their sexual relationships. These researchers say that sexually transmitted diseases convinced our ancestors that it was better to have only one sexual partner for their lives. Canadian and German researchers have found that in prehistoric times, when hunter-gatherers settled in villages and cities and turned to agriculture, sexually transmitted diseases became widespread, causing the death of many of our ancestors. The spread of sexually transmitted diseases, apart from mortality, also leads to a loss of fertility in both women and men. This has a fundamental impact on the population growth of a human group. According to these scientists, the slowdown in reproduction and population decline led humans to decide to change their sexual behavior. These researchers created a mathematical model of the population division of hunter-gatherer groups and the potential spread of sexually transmitted diseases among them. They used this model to explain how sexually transmitted diseases spread and the heavy costs of these diseases on larger sedentary groups. These scientists say that in smaller groups, fewer than 30 people, there was no risk of sexually transmitted diseases spreading and thus polygamy (where men had more than one wife) was prevalent (and still is) in small groups, but in larger groups, to control diseases, monogamy became a social norm imposed on individuals. The author of this research, Chris Bauch from the University of Waterloo in Canada, says that this research shows how the human ecosystem and factors such as disease spread have a very significant impact on the formation of social norms and, specifically, group judgments. Bauch adds that these findings do not mean that if there had been medicines for sexually transmitted diseases in prehistoric times, people would not have turned to monogamy. He states, 'Modern societies are much more complex... and there are probably more than one reason to justify the imposition of the monogamy norm throughout history. It is naive to say that the foundation of marriage and monogamy will be dismantled and polygamy will become prevalent again if we solve the problem of sexually transmitted diseases.'