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How honeytrappers work
Here are the rules, at least for the high-class guys:
...Martinez has "rules of engagement": The target must not be drunk, there must be no touching, and the relative attractiveness of the trapper to the target must be equal.
"It's got to be a fair test," he explains. "So we make sure that we don't set a very attractive honey trapper on a not so attractive target, and vice versa."
"The customer needs a fair answer to the question of whether their husband or girlfriend is loyal."
So those who fail an "unfair" test count as loyal? But since eighty percent of all those approached fail, maybe the point is simply to drive home the decisive nature of the infidelity. A related question is whether the customer (usually the spouse) wants the target to pass or fail the test. Furthermore what does the customer want to think about the customer's own motives? Here is the full story, and thanks to Jeffrey Ely for the pointer.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on February 20, 2008 at 02:36 PM in Law | Permalink
Comments
Does failing a honeytrap test like that necessarily mean the person will cheat? Perhaps the argument is that if the person even asks for the number they fail, but I see the real point of failure as the first romantic contact. If the honeytrapped just gets the number is that necessarily bad?
Posted by: Mike at Feb 20, 2008 3:09:17 PM
I wish I were seductive enough to work for them. That job would rock so hard.
Posted by: Person at Feb 20, 2008 3:30:00 PM
If the honeytrapped just gets the number is that necessarily bad?
Yes. Yes it is.
Posted by: AMW at Feb 20, 2008 3:33:24 PM
What if the cheater is already in love (or infatuated, or taken if you prefer) with a specific someone else? If she's two-timing you with your best friend, does that really mean she'll flirt with random strangers as well?
Then again, does this system only work in the method described? Will cheaters only get caught if they go to singles bars looking for a practically anonymous hookup?
I do like the attempt to match attractiveness, though. That's clever.
Posted by: d.cous. at Feb 20, 2008 3:42:00 PM
My thought is that those using this service will do so as a way to rationalize conclusions that they've already reached. That, and because it's a way to set one's self up upon the figurative moral highground. As for creating mistrust in the relationship, the act of engaging these services speaks volumes about the customer's desire for control, their capability to discuss such matters with the spouse/significant other in question, and the extent of their trust in the aforementioned individual. I'd be interested in knowing how many, if any, of their customers do not already suspect infidelity, and how many of these tests are used as evidence in divorce cases shortly after the test is preformed.
What's also interesting is that the article only mentioned husbands and girlfriends as targets. Is that meaningless, or can one reasonably presume that the missing parties, ie wives and boyfriends, are the predominate customers?
Posted by: Elliot at Feb 20, 2008 3:47:29 PM
Great, so that's why that ugly chick was flirting with me.
Posted by: Keith at Feb 20, 2008 3:54:34 PM
I agree with Mike. I don't believe that a person has cheated until physical action has taken place. Whether in a relationship or not, people have fun flirting from time to time. My current relationship has been rocky and I would like to go out and remember what it's like to be single but I would never cross a physical line. I often start more in depth conversations with someone at a bar and I might just exchange numbers with someone because I find them interesting - since I am no longer going out hunting for a guy, I tend to get more female numbers than male ones. A friendly extrovert can unjustly get "honeytrapped"
Posted by: Female at Feb 20, 2008 3:58:57 PM
I agree with Mike. I don't believe that a person has cheated until physical action has taken place. Whether in a relationship or not, people have fun flirting from time to time. My current relationship has been rocky and I would like to go out and remember what it's like to be single but I would never cross a physical line. I often start more in depth conversations with someone at a bar and I might just exchange numbers with someone because I find them interesting - since I am no longer going out hunting for a guy, I tend to get more female numbers than male ones. A friendly extrovert can unjustly get "honeytrapped"
Posted by: Female at Feb 20, 2008 4:00:47 PM
Why do we insist on being jealous of what our wifes / husbands / significant others do on their own time?
Posted by: Matthew at Feb 20, 2008 4:00:50 PM
1. "relative attractiveness of the trapper to the target must be equal." -- I will never understand this. Everyone seems to think beauty is objective. But I rarely find the "objectively attractive" people attractive (although, perhaps my relative attractiveness does match those I do like? No idea there, I can't seem to judge myself.)
In addition, except for (a) before they open their mouths - for looking only and (b) when I have been drinking, I would not find someone attractive enough to exchange numbers with based on physical qualities alone. If they wanted to trap me they could not use this criteria.
2. this: "and they can warn that they will use the honey trap service in the future to test them again" poses an interesting question or two. Is this one way to train your SO or yourself, by putting the additional deterrent in place? If it is voluntarily agreed to in order to deter oneself, what does it say about that person's commitment level?
Is it those who are not committed enough and need help or those who are so committed that they are willing to put it into place in order to help ensure fidelity (more than others with the same hormone level)? What does it say about the relationship that the two would agree to it, and what will it do to trust in the long-term? I think its pretty sick, but some could argue that it could help shape a new attitude.
If, let's say, 30% or 50% of men cheat (I am just making numbers up) then could some percentage learn not to, using this technique - and would that be an overall positive? What if it was used for a couple of years before marriage and then the men could learn new behavior and it could be ended?
Don't think I am in favor of this - it sounds crazy Clockwork Orange or communist re-education to me - but it is an interesting thought experiment.
3. To answer "Why do we insist on being jealous of what our wifes / husbands / significant others do on their own time?" : Biology (with associated emotions) and practicality: the "ideal" open relationship doesn't work, it falls apart.
Posted by: liberty at Feb 20, 2008 4:30:13 PM
If a person is caught by honeytrappers, it seems like you've got an obvious problem. A person who will, in a chance meeting, try to engage someone in something sexual is almost certainly already cheating. But, not all cheaters will go after random strangers. So this test has a high false negative rate, if I had to guess.
Posted by: jason voorhees at Feb 20, 2008 4:45:49 PM
I'm pretty amazed by the 80% failure rate. Unfortunately, the article doesn't specify what constitutes a failure, exactly. Also, is it possible that they are not doing a good job matching attractiveness? Or possibly only people who are very suspicious, and rightly so, use this service. After all, I don't think it would be that hard to secretly cheat on someone, so maybe if someone expects that their partner is cheating on them, they've very likely right.
Posted by: mpowell at Feb 20, 2008 5:21:47 PM
Jason, 80% of people fail Martinez' test. If, among the remaining 20% there is a high false negative rate... almost everyone fails.
That high failure rate doesn't make sense to me unless one of the following holds:
1. There is not a high false negative rate. A cheater is almost always a cheater in all contexts, NOT in just a few contexts e.g. it is rare you find a case where the target married someone before finding their one true soulmate and are now torn between giving in to their desires and duty to their loved ones (much fiction to the contrary). Only gets us to a max of 20% passing the test, though.
2. Self-selection among Martinez' clientele works the right way (in most cases, the person actually turns out to be a cheater and their partner knows this). Or self-selection could work the other way around - if you were a relatively monogamistic person, but your partner was the type to hire a honeytrapper... wouldn't you be happy to receive an opportunity to get out, too?
3. The test is not really "fair." Deck is stacked in some way (EX if the honeytrappers are "confident, bubbly and outgoing" as the job description goes, and they show a strong interest in someone, that person will be overmatched even if attractiveness is equal).
4. Getting a number doesn't signal anything, as other commenters have hypothesized.
5. That raises the question of what the honeytrapper hirer is trying to prove: a strong but not unbreakable preference for monogamy with the hiring party, or a 100% GUARANTEE of it?
Maybe people ARE rational and, even if they don't intend to cheat, appreciate option value...
Posted by: Colonelbob at Feb 20, 2008 5:28:20 PM
@liberty: looks ARE important. Take a look at your partners over the years. If you're a 7, they've clustered around 7. Smart, fine, but looks matter a lot...
I agree with others that their is a huge self-selection/confirmation effect going on. As someone with (regrettably) experience in this area, knowing something *for sure* gave me a LOT more confidence to do what I had to do, not blame myself and have few regrets.
Posted by: David Zetland at Feb 20, 2008 6:55:59 PM
Doesn't it just seem easier to stop being monogamous? If the couples had rules about acceptable cheating, they would be better off financially (saves at least the cost of this "honeytrap"), emotionally (less lying is good for teh soul) and physically (I don;t know about anyone else, but I think sex is kinda fun. Not like baking a pie fun, but right up there with fun stuff like balancing your cheque book).
Posted by: Mike at Feb 20, 2008 8:18:05 PM
Talk is cheap, it's not really fair to call it cheating unless you go home with someone or at least make out with them.
Posted by: Andrew Thebikeman at Feb 20, 2008 8:19:34 PM
Introduce alcohol into a society which has never encountered it before and before long a large proportion of the population will be raging alcoholics. Similarly, if an average man is propositioned by a attractive woman he will have a very hard time saying no because this is a situation he has probably never encountered before :)
Posted by: Spiral at Feb 20, 2008 10:44:03 PM
Mike: Some of us would prefer not to catch herpes (or worse).
Posted by: Jacqueline at Feb 21, 2008 12:08:29 AM
"Mike: Some of us would prefer not to catch herpes (or worse)."
Then never have sex :)
If your goal is a consequence, i.e. if it has a known outcome, the method can be tested. What is worse: protected, safe sex you are aware of, or affairs you have no knowledge of? That can be tested. The argument that monogamy is safer only holds if people actually are monogamous, or if when they cheat they do so with at least a modicum of protection.
YMMV, but monogamy is taking a risk that the person you choose is 100% honest, whereas agreeing to cheat is risking only the effectiveness of the protection and precautions taken. I would say it is safe, base upon the evidence, to assume that the risk your partner is not faithful is greater than 0%, and whilst I don't know either stat, but I am sure one could quite easily quantify the risk of Herpes infection, and ways to minimise the risk, against the likelihood of having a cheating partner, whose actions can't be quantified. And that ignores the other benefits of an open relationship.
Posted by: Mike at Feb 21, 2008 1:21:53 AM
I wonder how many college professors would fail a honey trap.
Hey prof is their anything I can do for a better grade? ;-)
Posted by: Bob at Feb 21, 2008 9:05:28 AM
"I wonder how many college professors would fail a honey trap.
Hey prof is their anything I can do for a better grade? ;-)"
Hell, I suspect that explains a good part of the wage differential for professors versus other professions.
Posted by: Keith at Feb 21, 2008 9:24:01 AM
Mike, I would be interested to know if you can find any one person (let alone two or more) who would be willing to go along with your proposed system.
Sex, whatever it may be socially, is still an essentially biological process, and I don't think people are wired to approach sex with people in the same way we approach racquetball (it's fun, and can be done with anyone who's good enough to play with you). Even when "protection" limits the possibility of reproduction, I think people psychologically still approach sex in terms of reproduction (not exclusively, but partially), and that therefore it implicitly involves a rather high level of trust.
Certainly, this trust is not always well-placed, but I would guess that the average person would assign a very low probability to the chance that their SO is cheating on them (or would do so). Whether you would like to call it "possession" or not, people don't like to have their trust, even their only implicit trust, betrayed.
Posted by: d.cous. at Feb 21, 2008 10:27:12 AM
I think ColonelBob hit on an important point: the deck is probably stacked here. These honeytrappers are highly skilled at flirting. I also suspect the private "detective" is lying when he says he matches honeytrappers only with targets who are equally attractive.
It's in his interest to send out attractive, outgoing, confident honeytrappers. I've seen some TV shows about honeytrappers here and they have all been extremely attractive women who are fairly young. As someone above pointed out, if an average-looking, older guy is hit on by a woman who is more attractive than anyone he has ever been attracted to him, he's likely to stray.
An 80% hit rate suggests the honeytrappers are either very good or very attractive, or both.
Posted by: larry at Feb 21, 2008 11:23:11 AM
An 80% hit rate suggests the honeytrappers are either very good or very attractive, or both.
No, it suggests that the customers' fears are well-founded. I wouldn't think that people who have no suspicions about their SO's fidelity would spend the money to have them honeytrapped.
Also, I don't see why the honeytrappers should be similarly attractive to their targets. Infidelity is infidelity. That's why the marriage vow is, "forsaking all others," not "forsaking most others, except those who are really hot."
Posted by: Christina at Feb 21, 2008 12:50:58 PM
"No, it suggests that the customers' fears are well-founded. I wouldn't think that people who have no suspicions about their SO's fidelity would spend the money to have them honeytrapped.
Also, I don't see why the honeytrappers should be similarly attractive to their targets. Infidelity is infidelity. That's why the marriage vow is, 'forsaking all others," not "forsaking most others, except those who are really hot.'"
Christina, as to your first point, that may indeed be part of the explanation for the 80% hit rate. It's probably true that most of the customers for this kind of service wouldn't pay the money if they didn't think it likely their spouse would take the bait. It's very likely a blend of factors that makes up this high success (or failure, as he calls it) rate. Without more information, we can't tell which factors are more responsible for it.
To your second point, I think it's much more likely that a target would fall for a much more attractive and charismatic person than he or she has ever talked with. The temptation is simply greater.
You're correct that the marriage vows don't contain an exception for being hit on by a very attractive person. But I suspect that many more people(especially people who may not be in such happy marriages) are considerably more likely to fall prey to flirting by charismatic, very attractive people who are "out of their league" than they would to fall prey to flirters who are very much in their league.
A few months ago I read about some research in which guys were shown pictures of other guys and asked to rate which they wouldn't like their wives/girlfriends to spend alone time with. When the pictures were morphed into more masculine versions of the original pictures, the subjects generally said they would not like their wives/girlfriends spending time alone with them.
They recognized that the women would be more vulnerable to advances by certain guys and not so much by other guys.
Posted by: larry at Feb 21, 2008 1:24:17 PM
