Which gender is more loyal in a relationship?
Thursday, February 29, 2024. Revised Thursday, March 27, 2025.
Which Gender Is More Loyal in a Relationship?
That’s the wrong question.
Let’s get one thing out of the way: if you're asking, "Which gender is more loyal?" you may as well be asking which zodiac sign eats more tacos.
It’s an intriguing query—but only if you’re planning a Buzzfeed quiz, not building a healthy relationship.
As a couples therapist, I’ve seen loyalty wear many disguises: the quiet patience of a husband who cleans the cat’s litter box for 12 years without complaint, the fierce protectiveness of a wife who defends her partner’s ridiculous sock collection from public ridicule.
Loyalty isn't a gendered trait; it’s a human quirk—often messy, sometimes contradictory, and almost always misunderstood.
The Problem with the Question
In classic reductionist form, asking who’s more loyal is like asking which leg does more walking.
It oversimplifies an issue that is—like most things in human intimacy—deeply contextual, layered with history, culture, attachment patterns, and, yes, neurobiology. But don’t worry. We’re diving into all of that.
A Peek at the Research (Updated, No Bias Detected*)
The Romantic Mythology of Women as Loyalty’s Gatekeepers
The cultural script goes something like this: men stray, women stay.
From Homer’s Odyssey to Hallmark movies, women are portrayed as loyalty incarnate while men are wild horses that might, just might, come home to roost if they see a sufficiently teary-eyed reunion scene.
But is this narrative true?
Well, no.
In a meta-analysis of 50+ studies on love and attachment, researchers found that men were actually more likely to report falling in love first, expressing love earlier, and feeling more devastated by breakups (Wilkins & Arnett, 2023).
One such study published in The Journal of Social and Personal Relationships even found that men tend to fall in love faster and more often than women (New York Post, 2025).
Meanwhile, women showed greater long-term resilience post-breakup—a different kind of loyalty, to supportive friends and family has a protective effect.
Communication Styles ≠ Loyalty Levels
Dr. Deborah Tannen's seminal research on gendered communication styles reveals women often focus on emotional attunement and connection, while men may prioritize action and solution-finding (Tannen, 1990).
This means a woman might express loyalty with words ("Tell me how you feel"), while a man might express it by fixing your broken radiator at midnight without a word.
Couples often miss each other entirely—not because one isn’t loyal, but because loyalty is being expressed in different dialects.
Attachment Theory Is Not Gendered
John Bowlby’s attachment theory laid the groundwork for understanding relational loyalty.
People with secure attachment styles—whether male, female, or nonbinary—tend to exhibit more consistent, stable loyalty in relationships (Mikulincer & Shaver, 2016). Insecure attachment, on the other hand, correlates with jealousy, emotional withdrawal, and (you guessed it) infidelity.
What matters isn’t gender—it’s how securely you’re attached to your partner, and how that attachment plays out under stress.
Cultural Scripts & the Global Lens
In collectivist societies, loyalty might be directed more toward family systems than individual partners. In individualist cultures like the United States, loyalty gets privatized—it's about you and me against the world.
Gender roles also get shuffled in translation. In a study on marital fidelity across 48 countries, researchers found that cultural values, not gender alone, predicted loyalty behaviors (Atkins et al., 2001). In short: what loyalty looks like in Finland might be wildly different from how it's practiced in South Korea.
Real-Life Loyalty: How Couples Actually Experience It
As a therapist, I’ve seen loyalty take surprising forms.
Like my client who secretly attended every single Dungeons & Dragons game her partner livestreamed for three years without telling him, just so she could support him in spirit. Or the man who quietly carried his wife’s anxiety meds in his pocket just in case she forgot them during a flight.
Neither case fits neatly into gender boxes. But they’re both about love showing up when it’s inconvenient, unglamorous, and deeply personal.
So How Do We Cultivate Loyalty? (You Can’t Just Manifest It)
Here’s what works, backed by science and years of watching couples fight, cry, laugh, and eventually remember why they got married in the first place:
Go Meta with Communication
Deborah Tannen’s notion of metacommunication—talking about how you talk—is a game changer. Loyalty isn’t just what you feel; it’s how you clarify, repair, and reaffirm your commitment in real time. In therapy, we use this to help couples catch their patterns before they implode.
Practice Secure Attachment Rituals
Rituals are loyalty in action. The “I’m home” hug. The goodnight check-in. The “text me when you get there.” These small rituals reinforce a sense of safety and continuity. We’re not just in this—we’re in this.
Deconstruct Your Loyalty Myths
Using narrative therapy, couples can identify and rewrite the loyalty scripts they inherited.
Some men were raised to believe loyalty means providing financially. Some women were taught it means staying silent when they’re hurt. Neither story serves modern relationships well.
Name and Claim Your Loyalty Style
Are you the silent do-er? The words-of-affirmation loyalist? The fidelity fundamentalist?
Knowing your own style helps you communicate loyalty in a way that your partner can receive—and vice versa.
Which Gender Is More Loyal?
Let’s finally answer the question with the only intellectually honest answer: it depends.
It depends on individual personality, attachment history, cultural background, current stressors, and—let's be honest—how recently someone’s mother-in-law visited.
But here’s what we can say: both men and women are capable of astonishing loyalty. And both are capable of betrayal.
What's more interesting is how they each express loyalty, how they interpret it, and how they repair it when it falters.
Final Thoughts: Loyalty Is a Joint Venture
Let’s treat loyalty not as a static trait but a relational technology—one that requires regular maintenance, firmware updates, and occasional rewiring.
And I might also humbly suggest, perhaps the most loyal thing we can do is keep showing up, even when the dishwasher breaks, the toddler throws up, or your partner forgets to pick up the dry cleaning for the second time.
So, ask not “Who’s more loyal?” Ask, instead: “How are we learning to be loyal to each other, together?”
Be Well, Stay Kind, and Godspeed.
REFERENCES:
Atkins, D. C., Baucom, D. H., & Jacobson, N. S. (2001). Understanding infidelity: Correlates in a national random sample. Journal of Family Psychology, 15(4), 735–749. https://doi.org/10.1037/0893-3200.15.4.735
Mikulincer, M., & Shaver, P. R. (2016). Attachment in adulthood: Structure, dynamics, and change (2nd ed.). Guilford Press.
Tannen, D. (1990). You Just Don’t Understand: Women and Men in Conversation. Ballantine Books. Retrieved from DeborahTannen.com
Wilkins, D., & Arnett, J. J. (2023). The Romance Gap: Men and Women’s Emotional Investment in Relationships. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 85(2), 389–408. https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12845
New York Post. (2025, March 2). Men fall in love almost twice as fast as women, new research reveals
The Times UK. (2025). Love research shows men more romantic than women
