The easy marital health test

A small scientific study indicates a potentially reliable test for the health of a marriage, as well as a man's marital ALPHA/BETA status:

[T]he participants' commitment to and satisfaction with their relationships did not seem to change with fertility, the researchers found. But women with less sexually attractive partners seemed to feel less close to their beaus as they moved from their least fertile to most fertile period. Meanwhile, women matched with the most sexually attractive men seemed to experience the opposite effect.

"Women with the really good, stable guy felt more distant at high-fertility periods than low-fertility periods," Haselton explained in a statement. "That isn't the case with women who were mated to particularly sexually attractive men. The closeness of their relationships got a boost just prior to ovulation."

The researchers found the same trends when they repeated the experiment with 67 new participants. In this phase of the study, the researchers added a new questionnaire that had the women rate their partners' flaws, such as thoughtlessness, moodiness and childishness. Women paired with less sexually attractive guys were significantly more likely to find fault with their partners during the high-fertility period than the low-fertility period.

 In other words, if your wife is particularly sexually responsive in between her periods and gets irritable when she's getting them, she probably finds you to be sexually attractive to her and your marriage is likely in pretty good shape.  On the other hand, if your wife is at her most irritable when she isn't about to have her period, and around that time, she has an inexplicable, but dependable impulse to put on a short skirt and go out dancing with her friends on her monthly girls night out, well, there is a good chance she doesn't find you to be particularly hot stuff.

But don't worry, the researchers are careful to assure BETA married men.  The fact that she is regularly drawn to have sex with other men she finds more attractive doesn't mean that she wants to forgo the benefits of a long-term relationship with you.  It's just a pity that these mysterious urges tend to strike at her most fertile time of the month.  Perhaps, if you're lucky, the baby will even look somewhat like you.