The Third Mind

Central Six

Sexual traits are also well predicted by the Central Six [personality traits]…The highly sociosexual, open, impulsive, and selfish tend to invest more of their time and energy in “mating effort” rather than “parenting effort”: they are constantly seeking new sexual partners rather than raising the offspring from existing relationships. On the other hand, people with “restricted” sociosexuality (the virginal, the chaste, and the happily married) have fewer sexual partners, less infidelity, lower openness, higher conscientiousness, higher agreeableness, and lower extraversion. They invest more time and energy in parenting effort and less in mating effort.