Revealed: The 'adultery capital' of the UK as 'curious' couples explore infidelity - and they might have been inspired by hit Disney+ show Rivals

Steamy escapades, bougie luncheons and straying eyes would have Rivals fans believing that married couples in the Cotswolds are constantly cheating on one another amid glamorous dinner parties and tennis matches in the garden.

But according to data, they're not far off, as Cheltenham - often dubbed the region's 'cultural capital' - has now been crowned the UK's 'new adultery capital'.

According to figures from the annual Infidelity Index data provided by IllicitEncounters.com, the UK's 'leading affairs site', 6.98 per cent of the town's population have reportedly had affairs this year.

And since the release of Jilly Cooper's bonkbuster TV adaptation on Disney+, sign-ups for the site across the Cotswolds have risen by a whopping 47 per cent, in what is being called 'the Rivals effect'.

Not far behind Cheltenham, known for its posh surroundings and four-day horse racing festival, was Farnham, Surrey, with 5.99 per cent of people allegedly cheating on their partners.

In third place was Motherwell, Lanarkshire (5.63 per cent), followed by Warwick (5.61 per cent) and Braintree in Essex (5.55 per cent).

Elsewhere, 5.36 per cent of the population in Rhyl, Denbighshire were reportedly caught up in affairs, as were 5.35 per cent of people in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire.

Towards the bottom of the list were Newbury, Berkshire (5.23 per cent), Frome, Somerset (5.18 per cent) and Wilmslow in Cheshire, (5.12 per cent).

Commenting on this year's Infidelity Index results, sex and relationships expert at IllicitEncounters.com, Jessica Leoni said: 'While picturesque towns like Cheltenham may seem serene on the surface, data suggests that love lives here are anything but tranquil.'

She also remarked that Rivals may be 'fuelling some extra curiosity this year'.

'A show like Rivals doesn't directly cause an affair,' Jessica clarified, 'but its mix of forbidden love and glamorous Cotswold settings adds a layer of fantasy that can influence people's perspectives on relationships, especially in places like Cheltenham where the show feels close to home.'

But clearly not everyone in the Cotswolds has straying eyes - Swindon in Wiltshire, which borders the area, has been dubbed the UK's 'most faithful town', with only 0.35 per cent reportedly cheating.

Close behind are Bracknell, Berkshire (0.36 per cent), Dewsbury, West Yorkshire (0.39 per cent), Castlereagh in County Down (0.44 per cent) and Rotherham, South Yorkshire (0.58 per cent).

This year's poll also reveals a national rise in infidelity, with affairs up 8 per cent across the UK since the start of the year – the highest annual rise in the 20 years since the site was founded.

Meanwhile, earlier in 2024, researchers claimed that when women are unfaithful, it is because they want 'good genes' for their offspring, known as 'dual-mating theory'.

Women reportedly tend to seek out more attractive affair partners for their genetical material, but stay with a long-term mate who would make a better parent.

However, some participants reported straying out of boredom or a lack of investment from their current partner, saying the simply wanted to have their cake and eat it too.

The study was conducted by Australian and UK researchers who surveyed 254 heterosexual people, 116 of whom were women, and asked them to measure their physical, personal and parental attraction to both partners.

Participants were asked to rank the physical attraction stating: 'He was very sexy looking'; 'I didn't like the way he looked', or 'He was somewhat ugly', among others.

Questions about their parental attraction to their affair partner included: 'I thought he had good fatherly qualities'; 'I thought one could depend on him to care for a child', and 'I believed men like him made bad fathers'.

The study , published in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior, found women ranked their affair partner's physical attraction as 1.93 points higher than their primary partner while the parental attraction was 3.33 points lower.

Their findings backed up what's called the dual-mating theory - where women cheat to obtain 'good genes' for their offspring while relying on their primary partners to be good co-parents.

However, the researchers reported that they found no evidence that the participants preferred their affair partner over their long-term mate.

'Infidelity is a tactic that serves a variety of evolutionarily coherent strategies, including obtaining additional resources, switching to a new primary mate, and, especially in our study, acquiring genetic benefits for offspring,' Macken Murphy, a PhD student at the University of Melbourne told Psypost .

'However, while humans evolved to cheat, that doesn't mean we should, and most people don't.'

These findings mirror past studies that have also indicated that whether your partner cheats could come down to how good-looking they are, according to researchers at Harvard University.

In the new study, researchers also speculated that infidelity could be caused by the mate-switching theory - when a woman has an affair while searching to replace their current partner with someone better.

Although some women did report this as the reason for cheating on their boyfriend or spouse, the findings said this wasn't the main reason.

The researchers reported that some women said they cheated because they were 'bored', suggesting a drive for new sexual or romantic partners and experiences, and others said they wanted revenge in response to their partner's infidelity to retain a sense of justice and balance in the relationship.

A significant number of women did mention being unsatisfied with their relationship including experiencing feelings of neglect, unhappiness and a lack of emotional support.

'It might sound funny, but the evolutionary drivers of female infidelity in humans is an area of vigorous debate in my part of academia,' Murphy told Psypost, adding: 'In a way, there are too many good explanations for it!'