Ever wonder how people in open relationships actually make it work? Justin Mogilski is back on the show to break down what the research says. https://www.sexandpsychology.com/blog/podcast/episode-453-the-secrets-to-a-successful-open-relationship/

Does CNM = cheating? In this episode, Dr. Justin Mogilski breaks down why people often confuse consensual non-monogamy with infidelity, and what the research actually says. https://www.sexandpsychology.com/blog/podcast/episode-452-what-people-get-wrong-about-open-relationships/

Part 3 is now live 📜 Here, I discuss what we learned about infidelity from our data, and why I think CNM is a better way of having multiple partners than infidelity. Link and notable excerpts below:

Our adversarial collaboration is now published. "Defining diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) by the scientific (de)merits of its programming" In Theory & Society. Thank you to my incisive coauthors: Lee Jussim, Anne Wilson, Bryan Love 🧵below t.co/RMfzBfraA7

Months ago I began an adversarial collaboration with Drs. Lee Jussim, Anne Wilson, and Bryan Love to make sense of DEI public discourse. Today our paper was accepted at Theory & Society. We suggest a scientific standard for adjudicating the (de)merits of DEI 🧵👇

My advisee, Faith Swanson, will have a virtual poster tomorrow morning at #NEEPS2025 on mate value discrepancies and conflict among partners in consensually non-monogamous relationships. Collab w/ Rhonda Balzarini and Taylor Himes. She’s brilliant. Ask her tough questions!

I’ll be at the Human Behavior and Evolution Society (#HBES2025) and NorthEastern Evolutionary Psychology Society (#NEEPS2025) conferences this week and the following. Looking forward to cracking rocks with ya’ll ;) Say hi if you see me.

In 2021 Sari van Anders published a fascinating piece about diversity in sex/gender research (link below). The excerpt here is what inspired me to post. I have not seen privilege in social power defined this way before. This is "overempowerment":

This is my last entry for “Making Sense of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion”. Here, I revisit the prediction that I made about DEI before reading this book. I then draw my conclusions and levy a few critiques. I'll leave highlights in the comments. open.substack.com/pub/justinmo...

If I redid this, I'd add porn more explicitly. If you treat porn as a sexual partner with whom your other partner(s) feel they must compete for attention, resources, etc., you've run into some of the challenges of managing multiple relationships. link.springer.com/referencewor...

Making Sense of DEI - part 4 open.substack.com/pub/justinmo...

Making Sense of DEI - part 3. Here, I delve into how organizations build trust from accountability, accountability from power, and power from people. open.substack.com/pub/justinmo...

Such a learning experience to help with the design, lit review, and analysis of this project. We asked people to retrospect how psychedelics changed the quality of their relationship(s), their number of partners, and their gender/sexuality. #JSexResearch www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1...

My second entry on "Making Sense of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion". I summarize the history of DEI as presented in Lily Zheng's "DEI Deconstructed". If you want to learn a bit about the origins of DEI in North America and Europe, take a look. justinmogilski.substack.com/p/making-sen...

If it weren’t for the women in my life, I think I would have broken a lot more. Happy #internationalwomensday

Here, I engage with the debate around DEI by reviewing the book "DEI Deconstructed" by Lily Zheng. It appears on the Spring 2025 reading list for a professional administrator training program that serves all of North America (CAWA). Walk with me... justinmogilski.substack.com/p/making-sen...

I listened to the most recent episode of the "Beat Your Genes" podcast where Dr. Doug Lisle was asked how a wife should handle interest in extra-pair sex. I disagreed with him. So, I wrote this article. Unexpectedly, I also talk about incels. open.substack.com/pub/justinmo...

Now in Denver for SPSP until Sunday. Look up my talks if you’re interested in: 1) psychedelics + sexuality, or 2) how stigma against consensual non-monogamy might be explained by false inferences about sociosexuality. So, only boring stuff. Say hi if you see me!

What are the best published, peer-reviewed article(s) on the psychology of *devotion* to someone? Not just commitment, investment, or loyalty. I mean: enthusiastic, adoring, filled-with-fervor, willingness to sacrifice yourself in service to someone who you perceive is powerfully worthy.

I liked this article published by Aporia for its clarity and most of the logic. I’m also cautious that it links to white pride news in the last sentence. I want to engage because its first premise about marriage is the same that I make, but we draw diff conclusions👇

Tenure track position in cognitive, experimental, biological psychology: www.schooljobs.com/careers/jsum...

I decided that I had some things to say about the term “gender”, given what I've seen discussed in the past week. Link below.

"life is generally a tragic prospect, and we have good reasons to regret that these are the constraints of our predicament... here, as elsewhere, the pessimist tradition is illuminating"

Yeah, this gets at it. Though, I also think Sam Harris overuses "psychotic", "barbarian", and other ~vague terms to describe groups whose beliefs detract from secular improvements to wellbeing. He's right: how influential people say things matters. open.substack.com/pub/samharri...

Addendum: if you balk at “vast majority”, please take stock of how many parasocial relationships (e.g., via movies, shows, video games, fantasy role play, religion, history, science) you currently have. If you’re not a massive socialite, you’re probably here already.

I think it’s OK if the vast majority of a person’s relationships are parasocial, as long as they have at least a few deep personal relationships that they maintain. Sometimes you want a relationship without the baggage of the reality of a personal relationship, and it might...

"These results suggest that the shift towards more lucrative foraging strategies may have been a key event in body size and SSD evolution in crab spiders". I think widespread, lucrative foraging pushes humans into scramble (vs. contest) competition, too. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1...

Michelle’s writing is so direct and clear, and Shari kept our analyses sane and stringent. Don’t let the humble title fool you. We tackle some critical questions about how people derive satisfaction in their relationships. My favorite excerpts are below👇

Check out our NEW✨ study w/ @justinmogilski.bsky.social & Shari Blumenstock, available #OpenAccess! We investigated how nurturance and eroticism are associated with relationship satisfaction in monogamous vs. #CNM individuals from multiple countries. The results are pretty intriguing!

Months ago, I watched Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities. Fav episode: when the girl obsessed with same-sex competition kills and stuffs her husband because he accepts her too much as is at a time when she feels need to change. m.imdb.com/title/tt1526...

Male investment adapts to sex ratios: In taverns, men reached the bar faster to order drinks when groups had higher male-biased sex ratios (ASR) or fewer women. Similar to other species, men adjust investments to maximize mating opportunities #HBES #EvPsych royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10....

"Because humans evolved to be highly mutually dependent on others to solve myriad adaptive problems, there is immense variability in the types of interdependences humans experience. Here, we describe the kinds of variation in interdependence humans experience" psycnet.apa.org/record/2025-...

Badman et al. (2022) show that the self-reported perception that you cannot easily meet new people (i.e., low relational mobility or “social rigidity”) predicts loneliness beyond # of close friends. A fun tidbit about marriage...🧵

My problem with "marriage makes relationships better" discourse is that not all marriages have the same norms. I'd rather talk about which marriage behaviors make people happier, why, and when. I taught a Psychology of Marriage course this semester. Here's a 🧵

Some colleagues and I want to submit a panel to an evo psych conference (HBES or NEEPS) to discuss what to preserve, remove, or improve about DEI initiatives, and how DEI should apply to evo scholarship. We need thoughtful defenders and critics of DEI with recent, relevant expertise. Recommends?

First manuscript from the international Multiple Relationships Maintenance project was accepted @ Journal of Sex Research with first author Michelle Larva, and Shari Blumenstock. Do you need a relationship to be highly nurturant AND erotic if you have several partners? 🤫👂🏻more soon

Experience/desire for CNM = less stress by ambiguous (i.e. unfamiliar, complex) situations. Experience in open/swinging = more comfort with ambiguity than poly. Desire to start open/swinging = less comfort with ambiguity than desire to start poly. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....