In 2005, the Washington Times published an article entitled, “Depression: A new sexually transmitted disease.” In it, the author reported that according to the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, depression often follows early sexual activity. The study followed over 13,000 middle and high school students for two years. Of the abstinent teens, only 4% experienced depression. On the other hand, girls who were sexually promiscuous were eleven times as likely to be depressed. What’s significant about this study is that the depression did not seem to cause the sexual activity, but vice versa.

Meanwhile, David Schmitt, an evolutionary psychologist at Bradley University in Illinois and founding director of the International Sexuality Description Project, reports that East Asian men and women from Confucian-diaspora countries exhibit worldwide lows in short-term mating behaviour  – that is, they have a particularly low appetite for sexual variety. Given that rates of cuckoldry are, by international standards, exceedingly low in China, the desire for chastity is likely inherited from the preferences of parents. Studies using the Parental Influence on Mate choice scale, developed by the evolutionary social psychologist Abraham Buunk of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, show that East Asian parents have almost twice the influence on their children’s mate choice as do Dutch and European Canadians.

David Buss, an evolutionary psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, found in a study published in the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology in 1990 that Chinese men ranked chastity the third most desirable trait after health and desire for children. By contrast, African, Eastern European, Western European and South American groups ranked chastity at or near the bottom of 18 total preferences.