Polyamory Research Survey

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As a dyad, is that a monogamous couple? And I have been several triad relationships and in an intense situation, I would protect all of them. There is no choosing, try to harm my wives and you will be unhappy.
Also as for therapists I would like to see this continue. I did try to talk to one once about it and was told to leave the office. Interestingly she advertised as being gay/lesbian friendly.
 
As a dyad, is that a monogamous couple? And I have been several triad relationships and in an intense situation, I would protect all of them. There is no choosing, try to harm my wives and you will be unhappy.
Also as for therapists I would like to see this continue. I did try to talk to one once about it and was told to leave the office. Interestingly she advertised as being gay/lesbian friendly.

Re: therapist - that is awful, and unethical, I think. The therapist in the very least should have helped you find a therapist who could work with non-monogamous clients/patients.

Re: caregiving/protecting - yeah, that makes sense - you'll want to protect all of them equally, I agree. The caregiving system is different somewhat I think from the attachment behavioral system, i.e. the part of us that seeks to be cared for in times of distress or danger.
 
She was an ass, I thought of complaining, but I had more important things to do and how many of us will go to here. We are poly, we know that, it is just adapting to life. As the Montana triad said, we just want legal rights. Hey you don't like that I have two wives, so!
 
She was an ass, I thought of complaining, but I had more important things to do and how many of us will go to here. We are poly, we know that, it is just adapting to life. As the Montana triad said, we just want legal rights. Hey you don't like that I have two wives, so!

Amen! I mean, gee whiz, I work with people all the time that are different from me in terms of values, beliefs, ideologies, opinions, etc. If I turned away everyone I disagreed with I'd never do any therapy at all!
 
You asked me what my experience is with survey design. I was married to a political scientist who studied education, race and identity and learned from her about the complexities of creating a valid survey that yielded usable results.

So not an expert at all but I have developed an eye to what seems like good (as in provides usable data) vs. bad (as in muddled conceptual development of what is being studied, the limits of what is being studied and so on, which may threaten usable results) survey design.

You were indeed clear on the particular population that was being studied - current committed couples with other partners - in the description of the study. However what I noticed is that there was no separation, no acknowledgement that that population represented only a portion of a wider community. I think language something like 'We are studying a subset of polyamorous relationships for the purpose of [fill in blank]' would have gone a long ways towards alleviating my concerns.

I am well aware it is incredibly difficult, maybe impossible, to design a survey that would capture information about an entire range of a given community. It would take years, lots of money and deep institutional pockets (like the U.S. Census Bureau or long established think tanks). I know that surveys - in order to get good data - have to select down to a narrow focus. That's the nature of the beast. So I never expected this survey to be able to do more than look at a portion of the community. I also know that surveys sometimes have to decide if they want to look at identities held by given population or the actual behavior of those populations (the two are often not similar at all!).

I was very pleased to see the further discussion of the purpose behind the survey. (I also know that this disclosure can possibly alter the results so I appreciate the decision to tell us.) From that perspective the design of the survey makes more sense.

The place of the couple in poly is pretty fraught. It is a basic unit of society. As such it has a lot of expectations, assumptions, weight and privilege. (Google 'couple privilege' if you are not already familiar with that phrase. It will be immensely helpful to you professionally to think about the implications on your clients.) And that weight poses challenges to people, both in existing dyads and those who want to date people in dyads, or are open to partners creating new dyads. Yet, we also remind folks who post here asking for help that poly relationships are at their core, related sets of dyads. For example, a triad where all three partners are involved with each other has multiple dyadic relationships that all need care, attention and focus. Poly doesn't actually collapse dyads into something else - it typically expands and alters them. So that was a long winded way to say that focusing on dyads makes sense to study at least a part of the poly population.

We also don't really know who makes up the poly population, or even what the majority of relationship structures might be. I suspect that outside of this forum (which is not a random sample! :)) more people do some form of hierarchical polyamory.

And yes the words you use - primary, etc. - will have different and have varying meanings within poly cultures - and we often don't agree on the meanings ourselves. And that meaning may not align with a more 'mainstream' understanding of that word at all. I don't know how you would resolve that, except by noting that it exists and start thinking about how it might shape your data.
 
Then good luck on your study, may you open doors, ever have questions, let me know. I would not want anyone to go through the BS I did, it slowed down life too much
 
You asked me what my experience is with survey design. I was married to a political scientist who studied education, race and identity and learned from her about the complexities of creating a valid survey that yielded usable results...

...And yes the words you use - primary, etc. - will have different and have varying meanings within poly cultures - and we often don't agree on the meanings ourselves. And that meaning may not align with a more 'mainstream' understanding of that word at all. I don't know how you would resolve that, except by noting that it exists and start thinking about how it might shape your data.

Thank your for your input! Definitely limitations. Science involving human beliefs and behaviors is harder than the "hard sciences" in some ways. :)
 
....we believe that in terms of evolution and survival, the brain will automatically choose *one* person over the other(s) when threatened sufficiently, for example. Who this partner is might change all the time, even, but in any given moment, there has to be a preference, just because it's a matter of survival in our brains. Children do the same thing - they might even equally prefer mom and dad or mom and mom or whatever their caregivers may be, but in a moment of intense distress, with both caregivers in the room, they will choose one of them rather than be frozen not knowing what do to. ....


This is quite an assumption, especially if it's based on studies with children. Children make all sorts of choices that an adult would not. It's good that you recognize your beliefs about the human brain, but that's all they are - beliefs. I'm not sure there is much science to support that the human brain "automatically" chooses to align with one and only one protector in times of severe distress (as opposed to having been socially conditioned to.)

It's also good that you recognize that the non-monogamous people you encounter are a self selected group of couples in some form of crisis. Sounds like your study is aimed at helping this particular group.
 
This is quite an assumption, especially if it's based on studies with children. Children make all sorts of choices that an adult would not. It's good that you recognize your beliefs about the human brain, but that's all they are - beliefs. I'm not sure there is much science to support that the human brain "automatically" chooses to align with one and only one protector in times of severe distress (as opposed to having been socially conditioned to.)

It's also good that you recognize that the non-monogamous people you encounter are a self selected group of couples in some form of crisis. Sounds like your study is aimed at helping this particular group.

Well, I disagree that it's "quite" an assumption, but I do agree that it is based on an assumption. :) I wouldn't claim that any of this is 100% fact, so yes, everything less than that would be in the realm of belief, supported by varying degrees with theory and evidence. Attachment theory posits that the these processes exist from the "cradle to the grave." I think so far there is enough research on adult attachment to strongly support that the processes are similar in childhood and adulthood, even if they are not the same. But, for sure, the good thing about the scientific method is theories are always open to being disproven or modified. Much to learn, we have, on the experiences of polyamory. :)
 
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I think everyone would agree that we know very little about the human capacity to love. How much or how many people we are able to deeply love simultaneously is very different than who we lunge for in moments of extreme danger. The growing polyamory movement would indicate that humans have an expansive ability to love and attach that far exceeds the socially reinforced common belief in "one at a time."
 
I think everyone would agree that we know very little about the human capacity to love. How much or how many people we are able to deeply love simultaneously is very different than who we lunge for in moments of extreme danger. The growing polyamory movement would indicate that humans have an expansive ability to love and attach that far exceeds the socially reinforced common belief in "one at a time."

Amen to that. I agree.
 
If you are going on the "who do I turn to in a crisis" - well, that depends on the particulars of the crisis! Dude is bigger and stronger...MrS has better aim and knowledge of firearms...which is the better defense? Are we talking zombies or psychos or regular robbers? When it comes to "who do I attend to first"...that would be a matter of triage (I am a medical professional), who can I save? who has a better percentage of survival?
 
If you are going on the "who do I turn to in a crisis" - well, that depends on the particulars of the crisis! Dude is bigger and stronger...MrS has better aim and knowledge of firearms...which is the better defense? Are we talking zombies or psychos or regular robbers? When it comes to "who do I attend to first"...that would be a matter of triage (I am a medical professional), who can I save? who has a better percentage of survival?

Zombies for sure. :D

:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
 
Zombies aside, the "distressing" situation of the house being on fire or whatever was meant to be metaphorical. :) We are attaching mammals. We have an attachment behavioral system that gets activated in moments of distress. That system will guide us rather effectively to reach out to the nearest caregiver. If there is more than one option, we'll prefer one over the others - there will always be a hierarchy in this sense - after this discussion though I'm starting to realize that an "attachment hierarchy" may not be what poly folk view as a hierarchy or "primary partner" or whatever at all. We're probably talking past each other. Who the primary attachment figure is can change, and perhaps on a less-conscious level, while a "primary partner" in a polyamorous relationship seems like a different thing. We're learning, so thanks for the comments.

Happy 4th!
 
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Well, I disagree that it's "quite" an assumption, but I do agree that it is based on an assumption. :) I wouldn't claim that any of this is 100% fact, so yes, everything less than that would be in the realm of belief, supported by varying degrees with theory and evidence. Attachment theory posits that the these processes exist from the "cradle to the grave." I think so far there is enough research on adult attachment to strongly support that the processes are similar in childhood and adulthood, even if they are not the same. But, for sure, the good thing about the scientific method is theories are always open to being disproven or modified. Much to learn, we have, on the experiences of polyamory. :)

Okay, supposing that it's true that our mono normative society pushes us to recognize one person as our protector, but us poly people tend to see our partners as protective for different reasons, you have not allowed us to express that. You have not allowed us to show that we can create "primary" attachments to more than one person, which, for many of us, is the crux of us being polyamorous.

Besides, only one person's attachment theory (Bowlby) suggests that the attachment process is to one caregiver. Others, especially more recent studies, show otherwise. In fact, that was always a major criticism of Bowlby.
 
Testing protection seeking behavior under extreme distress isn't testing whether the human brain is able to emotionally attach to multiple people simultaneously without needing to prioritize. You're operating from a base assumption of the human brain's need for a love hierarchy and there are many polyamoriists who do indeed prioritize this way, but there are many who do not, expanding the very basis of a poly approach to relationships, which is the notion that love for one does in fact not take from love for another.

We all know that humans can "love down" in equal measure as is evidenced by parents who bring one child after another into a family. Adopted, blended and extended families prove that humans can accumulate loved ones throughout life without the need for a love hierarchy. A strict social code strongly reinforcing sexual monogamy doesn't prove that sexual love is inherently a zero sum game.
 
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Okay, supposing that it's true that our mono normative society pushes us to recognize one person as our protector, but us poly people tend to see our partners as protective for different reasons, you have not allowed us to express that. You have not allowed us to show that we can create "primary" attachments to more than one person, which, for many of us, is the crux of us being polyamorous.

Besides, only one person's attachment theory (Bowlby) suggests that the attachment process is to one caregiver. Others, especially more recent studies, show otherwise. In fact, that was always a major criticism of Bowlby.

What do you mean, I have not allowed you to express that? You mean on the survey? If so, right - we don't know enough yet (obviously) on non-hierarchical polyamory to include it yet, but we are learning and perhaps we will focus on that in a future study! Even in this study, non-hierarchical folks could be included if they're legally married to one of the partners. We just couldn't make the measurements and analysis work without measuring specific dyads.

And you are right, we do attach to more than one person. You can attach to many. No disagreement there.
 
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Testing protection seeking behavior under extreme distress isn't testing whether the human brain is able to emotionally attach to multiple people simultaneously without needing to prioritize. You're operating from a base assumption of the human brain's need for a love hierarchy and there are many polyamoriists who do indeed prioritize this way, but there are many who do not, expanding the very basis of a poly approach to relationships, which is the notion that love for one does in fact not take from love for another.

We all know that humans can "love down" in equal measure as is evidenced by parents who bring one child after another into a family. Adopted, blended and extended families prove that humans can accumulate loved ones throughout life without the need for a love hierarchy. A strict social code strongly reinforcing sexual monogamy doesn't prove that sexual love is inherently a zero sum game.

We do have assumptions of course like anyone. I disagree though that preference for caregiving for one person over another in a specific time means it's a zero sum game or taking love from the other. And the attachment behavioral system is a different thing from sex per se. Anyway, I'm totally open to more research on this - so if anyone has some please pass it along! I would sincerely love to read more. Until then, just changing assumptions based on some disagreements (or again, just miscommunications as it seems more likely) would be completely silly to do for all of us here. We can disagree, no worries at all. And rest assured we are definitely giving this whole thing a lot of thought in terms of studying those who report non-hierarchical non-monogamy in the future.
 
Interesting. I feel I am intimately aware of attachment theory - having adopted 3 older children from foster care (age 10+ at placement, various diagnoses - never RAD, but one very close). I know the lingo, at the very least. I do not believe my attachment to my primary (who you are defining as the spouse I am legally married to) is stronger, or more developed than the spouse I am legally blocked from forming a union with. Actually, with my non-primary, we've had to do much more work strengthening our dyad by having our wedding ceremony across state lines to avoid a charge (Maryland defines bigamy as just having a ceremony) and by structuring paperwork to make sure he is covered with insurance, healthcare and retirement and inheritance issues. I will be having to file more paperwork to change my middle name to his last name. If you are basing "primary" status on the amount of legal paperwork generated, then my unsanctioned civil union is much more primary. :)

Emotionally I feel attached to both of my spouses, and in a fight or flight situation, I honestly have no idea who I would run toward. The closest, maybe. When we received the news my father had died - in the middle of the night - I clung to my "primary" husband, because he was the one sleeping next to me, and the one who had answered the phone. The minute I regained some composure, I ran down the hall to wake up PunkRock and be comforted by him. The guys spent the rest of the time trading off holding me and packing my travel bag so I could leave for New York. They worked as a team to give me what I needed in a very trying time. They did an excellent job of providing support, and I didn't feel like I was desperately needing one over the other.

In a Zombie apocalypse, I would probably gravitate to the one who could teach me to survive! My "secondary" is much more involved with shooting and weapons, though to be perfectly honest, I'd probably stick with my daughters. They're fierce little fighters and both have very good marksmanship skills, with the oldest being an Army National Guard medic and the youngest intent on joining the police academy. :)
 
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