Does Swapping or Swinging Ruin Marriage?

If a marriage is already doomed, involving other people will not save it. If it is troubled, involving other people can help it depending on what the troubles are. Involving other people in it by cheating can definitely ruin it. But ethical nonmonogamy is not cheating. If a marriage is solid and stable, ethical nonmonogamy has the possibility to make it even better. It isn't for everyone, or all relationships, but is for some.

Swinging and swapping, which both forms of ethical nonmonogamy, are not the same thing. Swinging generally means that people in an established relationship get together at parties or events with multiple other couples, triads, etc. and individuals for the specific purpose of having sex, usually sex that is no-strings-attached. That sex may include many different people. Swapping usually means a couple gets together with another couple or two and they switch partners. It could be a one-time thing or an ongoing thing or something between that, and it could happen in the same room or isolated from each other.

A great answer to the question raised in the title of this entry was provided on Quora by Franklin Veaux...

Studies conducted of people in the swing community generally show that swingers have higher than baseline levels of marital happiness. 

Swingers: Mentally Healthier Than Monogamous Peers…when it comes to attitudes about sex and marriage they [swingers] are less racist, less sexist, and less heterosexist than the general population. Swinging appears to make the vast majority of swingers' marriages happier, and swingers rate the happiness of their marriages and life satisfaction generally as higher than the non-swinging population. Implications of the study and its limitations are also included. 

The Case of Swingers. EJHS 2000New Study Shows Swingers are More Likely to Stay MarriedStudy: Investigation of Consensually Nonmonogamous Relationships: Theories, Methods, and New Directions