Infidelity
Overview
In many intimate relationship
Intimate relationship
An intimate relationship is a particularly close interpersonal relationship that involves physical or emotional intimacy. Physical intimacy is characterized by romantic or passionate love and attachment, or sexual activity. The term is also sometimes used euphemistically for a sexual...

s in many cultures there is usually an express or implied expectation of exclusivity, especially in sexual matters. Infidelity (colloquially known as cheating) most commonly refers to a breach of the expectation of sexual exclusivity.

Infidelity can occur in relation to physical intimacy
Physical intimacy
Physical intimacy is sensual proximity or touching. It can be enjoyed by itself or be an expression of feelings which people have for one another...

 and/or emotional intimacy
Emotional intimacy
Emotional intimacy is an aspect of interpersonal relationships that varies in intensity from one relationship to another and varies from one time to another, much like physical intimacy. Affect, emotion and feeling may refer to different phenomena...

. The impact of infidelity is said to be not only about sex outside the relationship, but also about trust, betrayal, lying
Lie
For other uses, see Lie A lie is a type of deception in the form of an untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive others....

 and disloyalty.
Sexual infidelity by a marriage partner is commonly called philandery, adultery
Adultery
Adultery is sexual infidelity to one's spouse, and is a form of extramarital sex. It originally referred only to sex between a woman who was married and a person other than her spouse. Even in cases of separation from one's spouse, an extramarital affair is still considered adultery.Adultery is...

, or an affair
Affair
Affair may refer to professional, personal, or public business matters or to a particular business or private activity of a temporary duration, as in family affair, a private affair, or a romantic affair.-Political affair:...

.

What constitutes an act of infidelity varies between and within culture
Culture
Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...

s and depends on the type of relationship that exists between people.
Quotations

There is but one thing without honour; smitten with eternal barrenness, inability to do or to be: Insincerity, Unbelief.

Thomas Carlyle Chartism (1839), Ch. 8

He ridiculed the absurdity of refusing to believe every thing that you could not understand; and mentioned a rebuke of Dr. Parr's to a man of the name of Frith, and that of another clergyman to a young man, who said he would believe nothing which he could not understand:--'Then, young man, your creed will be the shortest of any man's I know.'

Samuel Taylor Coleridge Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T. Coleridge 21 April 1811

No one is so much alone in the universe as a denier of God.

Jean Paul|Johann Paul Friedrich Richter Flower, Fruit and Thorn Pieces; or, the Married Life, Death and Wedding of Siebenkäs, Poor Man's Lawyer 1796-97 First Flower-Piece

No matter where the skeptical thought originates, or how it gets access to our minds, we see at once that it flattens the level of life and every aspiration. It makes our character less vigorous. The gospel is not simply a philosophy of religion or law of life, but it is an apocalypse, showing the heavens to our thought, and so bringing its spiritual benedictions to every heart and life.

R. S. Storrs, p. 347.

The nurse of infidelity is sensuality. Youth are sensual. The Bible stands in their way. It prohibits the indulgence of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life.

Richard Cecil, p. 348.

What ardently we wish, we soon believe.

Edward Young, p. 348.

There is not a single spot between Christianity and atheism, upon which a man can firmly fix his foot.

Emmons, p. 348.

 
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