Researchers sampled 48 societies cross-culturally to study the genetic survival of male homosexual preference, which is argued to be deleterious in nature due to its fertility costs. The researchers test for a sexually antagonistic factor that would produce a pleotropic advantage, such as male homosexual preference increasing the reproduction of sisters. Utilizing theoretical models, researchers assert that the survival of male homosexual preference is a result of the positive association between social stratification and discriminate female hypergyny due to selection for attractiveness in females.

Authors investigate the prevalence of male homosexual preference (MHP) cross-culturally. They employ four models to test the link between level of social stratification and the probability of observing male homosexual preference (MHP). Authors believe that this link supports the hypergyny hypothesis, which proposes that increased social stratification allows for some sort of factor that improves functional female fertility, perhaps through marriage to men of higher social classes. This would thereby allow more access to resources and consequently the ability to support a greater number of more reproductively-successful offspring. Authors do not make a causal link, however; rather, social stratification may be associated with a yet-undetermined pleiotropic factor that is somehow positive despite its cost on functional male fertility.