Interesting title right? Well if you find yourself in the position of earning more than your husband then you might want to check the medicine cabinet. The study performed by Lamar Pierce between 1996 and 2006 on 200,000 Danish people found that men who earned less than their wives were more likely to use erectile dysfunction medication. This research also showed that the women in these relationships were more prone to sleeping and stress related disorders.
However the results of this study could be seen in several different ways. Firstly you could see it in the obvious and suggestive way that the provocative title indicates, that men who earn less than their wives are more prone to erectile dysfunction. Or you could look at it from another angle and think that those men are more comfortable in themselves to go and seek help for a genuine problem.
The obvious conclusion however is further supported by the fact that almost all of the cases where men used erectile dysfunction medication were in marriages where the men had married at a time when their wages were more than their partners. This could have led to them feeling emasculated.
Also they found that as the income disparity between the couple increased so did the amount of medication required. This is further support for the lack of pay causing bedroom malfunctions.
If you take a look at this study from an evolutionary psychology perspective then the results are expected. The men have evolved to be the ‘breadwinners’ of the household and if they have trouble fulfilling that role then they may find it difficult to feel masculine in other areas of their life.
Hopefully this piece of research will allow you to think about the modern attitudes of western culture in a new way. Even though we are all accepting the fact happily that income is becoming more equal between males and females is it having a damaging psychological effect on the males of the species?
