Here's what men really want

What is more important to you from a physical standpoint: a beautiful face or a great body? How much are you willing to give up for the other?

Would you consider long-term dating someone with great looks or a body everyone dies for? Studies reveal that human physical attractiveness appears to be an important signal of mate value. Men who see their relationship to be a short term fling want to get a peek at her body while for someone looking at a long lasting relationship definitely goes in for the face. It might seem a tough call to take for a lot of us while for others its crystal clear. Read on...

Roshni Chopra
It's definitely a tough call. I think guys always go for looks no matter what. It is the face you wake upto and not really the body. There are men who go for curves while there are a lot of them who go for the personality and looks. When you meet a person initially the attraction is bodily, but in the long term it is always the person who is beautiful form inside.

Kashmeera Shah
Image via WikipediaFor anyone it is the smile of a person that attracts you first and that goes for men as well. There are girls with extremely hot bodies with no looks. If it's a one night stand, looks or no looks, it does not matter at all. Bu tin case of a long term relationship a decent face is a pre-requisite. You have to be a complete package. For married women, they need to take care of themselves, whether it is their figure or hair. We cannot take our marriage or our husband for granted.

Shruti Seth
Most men who have gone for me are bacause I am a fun person. Guess I stimulate them intellectually than physically! It usually depends from person to person, but of what I have gathered guys go in for presentable looks. I mean there is no problem for a guy to go in for a woman with a voluptuous body. But they usually prefer a nicer face.

Vidya Malvade
In love the body or the face hardly matter. You fall in love with a person for what they are and not how they look. You are so taken in with their personality that everything else just fades away. Men looking for a short term relation just want to score. A lot of men want their partners to be fit and presentable. For that matter I too would want to look attractive for my husband everyday.

Luke Kenny
I feel both the curves and the face are equally important. They should compliment each other. I really cant decide, but its a visual world so looks do matter a lot. The first thing a person notices about a women is her looks. But every body is different with different dimensions and contours. If you get a woman who has the curves and the looks it's like a cake with icing and a cherry on top!

Ronit Roy
I think for me it has to be both - a combination of looks and body. That's because you cannot have a great body without a good face and a good looking face without a great body. And if you cannot find one, then perhaps you should wait!

Karanvir Bohra
I am a long term kind of a guy and in such a case it doesn't really matter if you want the body or the looks. What really matters is the chemistry between the two people. if given the choice between the two i would go in for a good body. You are born with a face which you really cannot change but you can definitely sculpt your body. A woman who works on her body is a sure shot thumbs up for me.

Ashmit Patel
For me there is no long term or there is no short term relationships. I have got to have a connect with that person, be it intellectually, spiritually or emotionally. Like when you enter a room, the first thing you notice about a women are her looks. So for me looks are always a first preferance.

Akashdeep Saigal
I agree with the statement that men do go in for the curves if they want a short affair. But when you are looking at a person in terms of long term, her being fat or thin does not seem to matter. There is a connect with the soul of a person. But I am sure every man out there is looking at a good package. But guys who don't get one end up looking everywhere!

Expert talk
Dr. Madhuri Singh, psychiatrist and marriage counsellor, "This choice hugely depends upon the personality of a man - one who goes for the body and the other who goes for the looks. The former category basically is interested in the physical pleasure of the relationship, which can be termed as a one night stand or a fling. While the latter is more interested in he emotional factor. The face or the looks come into play when the when the man wants to be with the woman for a longer time. But things are changing now. The younger generation does not bother about this a clear cut distinction unlike 20 years back. These days when people ge into a relationship they don't think about it in terms of short or long. It is jus that circumstances crop up that they end up parting ways. It is the inborn personality of a man what makes the man he is."

Dr. Rahul Gadge, psychiatrist, "When a guy is looking at a long term relationship the woman's personality - looks, behaviour etc, come into play. He has to be with her in the society and therefore it becomes necessary for a woman to have good looks. But in case of a short affair, a guy just goes for the body of a woman. He does not bother about how she looks, her emotions, her needs. All this becomes secondary to him."

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The Bachelorette Season 7: Conference Call with Ames Brown

This season on The Bachelorette, Ames was many things - classy, intelligent, funny, and warm. What he wasn't was the guy Ashley was looking for and after visiting his hometown and meeting his family, she decided not to give him a rose. Today, the portfolio manager from New York (who will soon be seen on Bachelor Pad) talked to RealityWanted and reporters in a press conference call about his time with Ashley on The Bachelorette.

Q. Gina, RealityWanted: What qualities did you see in Ashley that made you feel like you could see a long term relationship with her?
A. Ames: She's pretty much happy about everything, I think. She chooses difficult things in life but enjoys them. I don't know. She also seemed really curious about things we were doing.

Q. Gina, RealityWanted: Watching the show back, were there things that surprised you?
A. Ames: I think everything surprised me about her relationship about other guys. I was just focused on getting to know her well and our relationship. I didn't pay attention to what else was going on. Watching it, 90% of it was new.

Q. You're definitely different than the usual contestant on The Bachelorette. Why did you decide to go on the show?
A. Ames: I guess I didn't really know I was different, well frankly, until it was too late. I guess if I am different, it didn't really work. Hopefully, there is someone out there to whom my differences appeal.

Q. Watching back the hometown date and seeing her time with the other guys, was there anything that you didn't understand?
A. Ames: I felt like we had a great date. I think one thing I really picked up on, watching the hometown dates, was that my progress with Ashley was much slower than the other guys but I didn't see that as a negative. I was trying to take our relationship slower because I wanted it to last forever. Watching this show and even in real life, we see relationships that move really quick and then expire just as quickly. I felt okay about it. She's someone that I really wanted to make something lasting with. I enjoyed taking it slowly.

Q. What did your family think of Ashley?
A. Ames: I think my family really liked Ashley. I had a feeling they would like her beforehand and afterwards, I'm still pretty confident in that.

Q. Your sister noticed there was a lack of spark and Ashley even wrote about it on her blog on People.
A. Ames: Yeah, that was rough.

Q. What did your family think of it all?
A. Ames: They were pretty morose because they knew that I really wanted to move on to that next week in Fiji. They were sad because they knew I was really sad. We had a lot of potential.

Q. Someone said you're different than the other guys. Do you know what makes you different?
A. Ames: You know, that's the only question I can say I don't know the answer to. I believe it but I don't know.

Q. You said that you felt like you were falling in love with Ashley. Do you think, looking back now that you have hindsight, that you really felt that way?
A. Ames: I was getting very close to it. I felt definitely like nothing other than feelings of love under the magnolia ride or in that elevator. I guess I wasn't in as much of a rush or I was unaware of the timeline involved and that got me in the end.

Q. Do you feel like she's made a good decision?
A. Ames: I know what makes me happy but I don't know necessarily what makes her happy. The guys she kept around to the end are amazing. I think she probably made a good decision in the end.

Q. Do you have any regrets?
A. Ames: I had a wonderful time dating her. I don't wanna sound trite, but she is amazing. It was very, very painful in the weeks surrounding our breakup or whatever that's called when that happened but I would do it again.

The Bachelorette airs Mondays at 8/7c on ABC.

Infidelity Keeps Us Together

Congratulations to Dan Savage and his mantra “Good, Giving and Game.” And thanks to Mark Oppenheimer for bringing it beyond the alternative weeklies to a wider audience of mainstream, heterosexual couples (“Married, With Infidelities”). Honest communication with your partner surely is something to strive for in a long-term relationship, although it may be difficult at first for some women to define what they want, let alone articulate it.

DEB LEVINE,
Oakland, Calif.

Bravo to Dan Savage for his forthright thesis exposing the meshugas that is monogamy. Now if he can only convince my wife.

DAVID CHARAK,
Boca Raton, Fla.

I was struck by how Dan Savage’s approach to fidelity approximates the thinking of some who work with alcoholics and who believe that for some alcoholics, moderate drinking is the lesser of two evils. “Zero tolerance” is an absurd concept that does not and cannot work in any alcohol or drug program. How many members would A.A. have if participants were kicked out after “straying”? So why apply this unrealistic standard to marriage? For all of us, it seems that the approach to monogamy should be “one day at a time.”

MICHAEL G. BRAUTIGAM,
Brooklyn

I found it somewhat ludicrous that a gay therapist is dispensing advice on how to make heterosexual marriages succeed by allowing infidelities. The argument for “open marriage” was vigorously championed most recently in the 1960s and ’70s. The result was an enormous upturn in the divorce rate. My more than 54 years as a rabbi have taught me that the commandment “you shall not commit adultery” is still terribly relevant, and our religious traditions wisely maintain that marriage is sacred, the bonds between husband and wife are inviolate and that nothing shatters marital trust more than infidelity.

RABBI GILBERT S. ROSENTHAL
Director, The National Council of Synagogues,
Needham, Mass.

I appreciated Mark Oppenheimer’s views on marriage. One point I think he should have addressed is that people like Anthony Weiner and Arnold Schwarzenegger don’t have the luxury of working his valid points about infidelity into their marriages because they don’t enjoy the privacy that the rest of us do.

CHRISTINA SCHLANK
Manhattan Beach, Calif.

How are the Vitter and Clinton marriages “failed monogamous relationships”? Both the Vitters and the Clintons are still together, so either the couples in question had an agreement about having a nonmonogamous marriage, or they were able to get beyond the fact that their partners strayed. In the case of Schwarzenegger, I would bet good money that Maria knew about Arnold’s cheating heart before they got hitched. What spurred the divorce was the fact that he never told her about a child conceived with a domestic employee — right under her nose, in her own house. It was humiliation, in that circumstance, and outsize betrayal, not just the sex, that ended that marriage. Whoever is on the cover of Us Weekly is having his or her affair blared to the universe. I would argue that’s a lot more destabilizing than just sex.

JESSICA GROSE,
1:50 p.m., June 30, Slate.com

The most telling quote comes near the end: “The greater good is the home created for children,” Dan Savage says. “If there are children present, they’ll get past it. The cultural expectation should be if there’s infidelity, the marriage is more important than fidelity.” Having children shouldn’t give anyone the right to cheat just because staying together for the children is more important. Savage stresses repeatedly that the time to talk about nonmonogamy is before either partner in a relationship has a fling.

But whenever I find out that a friend or acquaintance with children is divorcing, I can’t help imagining myself in their situation and picturing what it would be like to see my kids only half the time, to have to split up Christmases and birthdays, to spend time worrying about pickups and drop-offs that should be spent on lazy Sunday mornings with pancakes and cartoons. Even if you’re the victim in the situation, you pay a pretty high price when you end a marriage.

RACHEL LARIMORE,
5:28 p.m., June 30, Slate.com

I am married and aware that my husband has posted on “menseeking women” on Craigslist from time to time. The pain and humiliation is indescribable. He gets to fulfill his fantasies and feed his ego, but there is not a day I don’t think about divorcing him for his selfishness. It’s complex to leave someone you love for nonmonogamy, but in the end this has to be at the heart of a marriage or the bond is broken. Don’t marry if you don’t intend to be monogamous.

MEG,
Greenwich,
Conn., 10:34 a.m., June 30, nytimes.com

As Dan Savage points out, the “age-old understanding” was that men could have their flings on the side, as well as frequent prostitutes, while women were virgins at marriage and monogamous afterward. Now, as far as I can see, the understanding is that both sexes will sleep around quite a bit or have a series of “relationships” then, once married, remain completely monogamous.

FLORAMAC,
Maine, 9:59 a.m., June 30, nytimes.com

In this country, we worship marriage and demonize infidelity. How many times did a friend of a “victim” who was cheated on tell that victim to leave? But not many friends will actually try to support the victim and try to help them analyze whether the relationship is worth holding onto. Most married couples that I know have had some sort of an extramarital affair. Unfortunately, some of them divorced because of their affairs, and many regret that choice. The essence of their regret is that they miss their friend/partner and the stability that went along with their marriage and children. So let’s stop judging and crucifying private sex lives and instead lend a hand to those who just need to talk and to sort out their true emotions.

MOMOFTWO,
New York, 10:10 a.m., June 30, nytimes.com

Nowhere in this article does it talk about the person the married person is cheating with. The “other woman” and the “other man” are frequent casualties of married people using them as a tonic to what ails their marriage. Often, a married person meets another person who expands their world, offers them love and a fresh start, but because of an oath they took years before, often foolishly, they are obliged to stick out their marriage, bored and unfulfilled.

SINGLEWOMAN,
New York, 11:31 a.m., June 30, nytimes.com

Cuddling More Important to Men in Long-Term Relationships

Despite traditional beliefs about what makes men and
women happy in relationships, a new study found
that kissing, cuddling and caressing are more
important to men than they are to women.

The researchers, from The Kinsey Institute in
Bloomington, Ind., were also surprised to find that
more men reported being happy in their relationships
while more women reported being sexually satisfied.
Women who were in relationships for at least 15 years
were more likely to be sexually satisfied than women
in relationships less than 15 years.

The study authors surveyed more than 1,000
couples from the U.S. and four other countries to
determine what factors predict relationship
satisfaction and sexual satisfaction. All study
participants reported being in their current
relationships for an average of 25 years.

"This study makes it clear our assumptions aren't
always borne out by research," said Jennifer Bass,
director of communications at The Kinsey Institute.
The researchers weren't immediately available for
interviews.

Psychologists who were not involved in the research
were intrigued by the finding that men with long-term
partners need touch and affection to be happy in
relationships, but say in general, touch is very
important.

"Touch from a person you love and trust is a major
emotional resource and a way that people can
regulate their emotions when they are upset," said
Aline Zoldbrod, a psychologist in Lexington, Mass.
"Couples who use touch to comfort, to compliment,
and yes, to seduce and arouse, are bound to be
happier."

"While the women in this study also like physical
gestures of affection, these gestures tended to be
associated for them with increased satisfaction in
their sexual activity," said Heitler. "For them, an
affectionate hubby leads to more sexual pleasure."

Many women in long-term relationships, however,
were not surprised by the finding that sex is so
important to women who have been with their
partners a long time.

"I have been with my husband since I was 19 years
old (I just turned 40), and sexual satisfaction is a
major part of why our marriage works," said Saideh
Browne of Brooklyn, N.Y.

Another woman, who wanted to remain anonymous,
said: "I'm a 46-year-old woman that has been married
for 30 years this summer. We have had ups and
downs in our sexual relationship over the years, but I
have to say that the times when we were having an
active sex life was when I was happiest in our
marriage."

Jessica Gottlieb, who has been married for 14 years,
said: "I'm a married woman, the world should assume
that I enjoy sex. It's part of the deal."

However, experts say sexual satisfaction is difficult
to measure, and it could also be the case that study
participants define it in different ways.

Later Years Very Different for
Men and Women

Susan Heitler, a couples psychologist in Denver
who also founded the online counseling resource
Power of Two, said previous studies have found
relationship needs change over time.

"Prior research has shown that as people age, men
focus more on general relationship satisfaction and
women ... increasingly value the sexual aspects of the
relationship," she said.

There could be a number of reasons why women's
need for sexual satisfaction increases over the course
of a relationship.

"Maybe after 15 years of being married, it's not a
difficult time as far as raising children is concerned,
and women can devote more time to their sexual
satisfaction," she said.

Experts also say biology could also be a reason.

"Men are at their sexual drive peak in their late teens
while women are at their peaks in their early 30s,"
said Fran Walfish, a Beverly Hills, Calif.-based
psychotherapist and author of "The Self-Aware
Parent."

"Men may become less concerned about sex because
they are feeling spontaneously aroused less
frequently with age," said Heitler. "They still like sex,
but they feel less desperate for it than in their
younger years."

Many women establish identities outside the home
and as they get older, feel more empowered to get
their sexual needs met.

"Women gain ego strength and a sense of their own
sexual rights as they age and so if expectations are
not met or their partner does not attempt to please
them, they can be upset, even angry," said Pepper
Schwartz, senior fellow at the Contemporary Council
on the Family and author of Prime: Adventures and
Advice about Sex, Love and the Sensual Years.

Other factors that predicted relationship happiness
in the study were good health among men and being
able to function well sexually among men and
women.

While men and women differed about what made
them happy in their relationships, both sexes
reported being happier the longer they were involved
with their significant others.

The study also found differences in relationship and
sexual satisfaction across cultures. For example,
Japanese men reported being more satisfied sexually
than American men, and Japanese and Brazilian
women were more satisfied sex
however, since subjects from the different countries
weren't all similar in terms of factors like age.

"The research does show interesting findings that
need to be explored much further to see how it
translates to a large international population," said
Amy Levine, a certified sexuality educator in New York
and founder of Sex Ed Solutions, a sex education web
site.

This study may also offer comfort to many men who
think they're the only ones whose wives or girlfriends
aren't always interested in sex.

"Perhaps this will soothe some of the men in their
thirties and forties who think that their situation of
having a wife who is not all that enthusiastic about
sex is unique," said Zoldbrod.

Surprising Results in New Study on Long-Term Relationships

A new study from the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction shows that physical tenderness in relationships is more important to men than women.

The study, published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, says men reported being happier in their relationships when there's more kissing and cuddling. Jennifer Bass, Communications Director for the Kinsey Insititute, tells 93 WIBC's Amber Stearns on Indy's Afternoon News another thing that stood out in the study was how women looked at their sexual happiness.

"We found that women, when they'd been married under 15 years, were not as sexually satisfied as their partners but once they hit 15 years, they reported more sexual satisfaction," Bass says.

The study was conducted with more than 1,000 couples from the U.S., Brazil, Germany, Japan and Spain. The participants were between 40- and 70-years old with an average relationship span of 25 years.

Couples report gender differences in relationship, sexual satisfaction over time

Cuddling and caressing are important ingredients for long-term relationship satisfaction, according to an international study that looks at relationship and sexual satisfaction throughout committed relationships, but contrary to stereotypes, tenderness was more important to the men than to the women.

Also contrary to expectations of the researchers, men were more likely to report being happy in their relationship, while women were more likely to report being satisfied with their sexual relationship. The couples, more than 1,000 from the United States, Brazil, Germany, Japan and Spain, where together an average 25 years.

The study from the Kinsey Institute at Indiana University, published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, is the first to examine sexual and relationship parameters of middle-aged or older couples in committed, long-term relationships. Research efforts to understand the place of sexuality in human lives rarely involves intact couples in ongoing relationships.

"You hear repeated research and commentary about divorce; but it's important to note that though divorce rates are high in the U.S., couples tend to stay married -- more than 50 percent of U.S. couples remain in their first marriage, and that number goes up to 90 percent in Spain," said Julia Heiman, director of The Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction and lead author of the article. "We know from other research that being in a long-term relationship has some value to health. Perhaps we can learn more about what makes relationships both sustainable and happy."

Participants in the study were 40- to 70-year-old men and their female partners, either married or living together for a minimum of one year. The study included around 200 couples from each country. The men and women answered gender-specific questionnaires and were assured that their responses would not be shared with their partner.

"This study on heterosexual couples provides a basis for future research on sex and gender, such as how same-sex couples may or may not show similarities and differences in relationship and sexual satisfaction," Heiman said.

RELATIONSHIP SATISFACTION

For men, relationship happiness was more likely if the man reported being in good health and if it was important to him that his partner experienced orgasm. Surprisingly, frequent kissing or cuddling also predicted happiness in the relationship for men, but not for women. Both men and women reported more happiness the longer they had been together, and if they themselves scored higher on several sexual functioning questionnaires.

Across all five nationalities, for both men and women, the Japanese were significantly happier with their relationships than Americans, and Brazilians and Spanish reported less relationship happiness than Americans.

SEXUAL SATISFACTION

Men and women both were likely to report sexual satisfaction if they also reported frequent kissing and cuddling, sexual caressing by the partner, higher sexual functioning, and if they had sex more frequently. On the other hand, for men, having had more sex partners in their lifetime was a predictor of less sexual satisfaction.

Men did report more relationship happiness in later years, whereas for women, their sexual satisfaction increased over time. Women who had been with their partner for less than 15 years were less likely to report sexual satisfaction, but after 15 years, the percentage went up significantly.

"Possibly, women become more satisfied over time because their expectations change, or life changes with the children grown," Heiman said. "On the other hand, those who weren't so happy sexually might not be married so long."

Compared with the U.S. men, Japanese men reported significantly (2.61 times) more sexual satisfaction in their relationships. For women, Japanese and Brazilian women were more likely to report being satisfied sexually than Americans.

"We recognize that relationship satisfaction and sexual satisfaction may not be the same thing for all couples, and in all cultures," Heiman said. "Our next step is to understand how one person's health, physical affection and sexual experiences relate to the relationship happiness or sexual satisfaction of his or her partner. So, we hope for more couple-centered than individual-centered understanding on relationship functioning and satisfaction."

###
Co-authors of the study are J. Scott Long and Shawna N. Smith, Indiana University; William A. Fisher, University of Western Ontario, London, Canada; and Michael S. Sand and Raymond C. Rosen, New England Research Institutes, Mass.

The study is available at http://www.kinseyinstitute.org/publications/PDF/Heiman couples midlife and older 5 countries.pdf.

The study was supported by an independent investigator-initiated grant from Bayer-Schering. The Kinsey Institute receives support from the Office of the Vice Provost for Research at IU Bloomington (OVPR). OVPR is dedicated to supporting ongoing faculty research and creative activity and developing new multidisciplinary initiatives to enhance opportunities for federal, state, and private research funding.

Keeping the Sex Alive in Long-Term Relationships

Boring. That’s a typical response when you ask many long-term couples about their sex lives. With all the demands of everyday life, work and family, it’s no wonder couples are bored with sex. Most sex experts say this doesn’t have to be the norm. Here are some of their suggestions to reignite the flame.

This Article

Improved My Health
Changed My Life
Saved My Life
Simone Bienne, a British sex and relationship expert, said to kiss as passionately as you did at the beginning of your relationship, and it will work wonders for your love life.

Dawn Michael, a sex counselor, wrote in the Los Angeles Examiner, “Make it a point to change up the sex, touch your partner in a different way, tease them throughout the day; buy sex toys, role play. Do whatever it takes to make the sex fun; fun sex is much more exciting than just having sex to get it over with, or just to ‘do it.’”

Another thing to do is schedule sex.

Anthony Smith, deputy director of the Australian Research Center in Sex, Health and Society at La Trobe University in Melbourne, told the New York Times, “Couples need to ask each other, ‘How much time do we want to spend having sex or being intimate, and what needs to go out of our schedule to make that time available?’ If people value sex as an important part of their relationship, and almost everybody does, then they need to put sex higher up the priority list.’’

Bienne said to appreciate your mate. I’ve seen sex lives change from stale to great in just two weeks by each partner saying something they appreciate about each other every day. Showing appreciation regularly like this not only makes you feel better about yourself, it gives a massive romantic boost to your relationship.

Robert Billingham, an associate professor in Indiana University Bloomington's Department of Applied Health Science, agrees. On About.com, he said, "The mistake most couples or one person makes is they're so much in love with their partner that they assume the relationship will last forever. They don't think it is something they have to work on."

In the Los Angeles Examiner, Michael said to go on sexy dates.Couples that are in long-term, monogamous relationships can do something sexy like dancing, going to a burlesque show, seeing a romantic sexy movie, or visiting a sex shop together. Make the evening more about teasing each other, rather than just eating a meal or drinking a drink.

This Article

Improved My Health
Changed My Life
Saved My Life
Most sex counselors also recommend keeping the bedroom a place for sex. No computers. No toys. No TV.

Sources:

http://www.sheknows.com/love-and-sex/articles/806584/sex-tips-to-make-lo...

http://www.askmen.com/top_10/dating/ways-to-keep-a-relationship-interest...

http://www.mirror.co.uk/life-style/sex-health/2009/06/22/top-10-tips-to-...

http://seniorliving.about.com/od/sexromance/a/rekindle_romanc.htm

http://www.examiner.com/love-and-marriage-in-los-angeles/how-to-keep-sex...

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/22/sex-and-the-long-term-relations...

Nurturing skills is critical to Mena's success story

It is no secret that education builds long-term relationships within and between communities. These relationships will play a crucial role in building the Middle East of tomorrow.
Given the increasing skills shortage in the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) and the abundance of young people in the region — half the population is under 25 years old — governments need to cooperate with the private sector in order to ensure that education is developed sufficiently to support and sustain strong economic development
This region has vast potential, and young people are more educated, more technologically literate, and more engaged with the news than ever before. We have seen much of their energy spill over into the streets of some countries, primarily out of a desire to live better lives. However, as the region continues to grow and evolve it will come up against the challenge of supplying the right people for the right jobs in its economies.
A recent report by the World Bank warned that Arab countries need to generate 100 million jobs for their youth by 2020, and high repetition and truancy rates continue to plague educational systems in many of these countries. Concurrently, many of the region's economies are expanding at a rapid rate that is creating a wealth of opportunities for employment and entrepreneurship.
Monumental efforts
Although regional governments are exerting monumental efforts to bring education to the masses, the evidence is undeniable that more needs to be done. Some 80 per cent of over 7.5 million university-level students in the region are enrolled in national universities, but these are full to the brim and lack sufficient financing. More importantly, the recently convened Global Education Forum highlighted that each university graduate needs to be supported by up to 10 people with vocational skills to be able to maintain sustainable economic growth.
These are staggering figures, and governments cannot — and should not — go it alone. It also means that we must look beyond what is fashionable for people to study, and to realise that popular assumptions about what constitutes a successful career can quickly become mismatched with economic realities on the ground.
Private sector companies which have found success in the region and want to help stimulate further success must therefore support the development of human skills and expertise locally. This must not only focus on professional disciplines, but should also offer vocational training and encourage the uptake of jobs by highlighting their importance to the economy. Several economies around the world have now ascended to global dominance thanks to the diversity of their workforces.
The region needs more scholarships and endowments for university students and fellows, and mandatory internships, apprenticeships or work-experience terms to involve students and recent graduates in hands-on industry experience that builds up their work ethic. We also need more business-education partnerships that begin in schools and continue all the way through people's careers, an approach that has been successful for Rolls-Royce, which runs a programme that enjoys a 98 per cent retention rate; with 90 per cent of apprentices going on to achieve higher qualifications, half to degree level. There are also other success stories in countries like France, with its Stage en France apprenticeship system.
Apprenticeship system
In fact, nearly all of the countries in the Middle East and North Africa have had centuries of experience in the apprenticeship system. Returning to this tradition could help alleviate skills shortages significantly, something which is already taking place in countries like Turkey, India and Pakistan.
Australian Apprenticeships involve 400,000 people in over 500 occupations, some of them as young as 14 years. In Germany it is nearly impossible to find employment without having completed an apprenticeship, and there are longstanding systems in place in countries like Austria, and even the UK which reinstated apprenticeship programmes in the 1990s following the abolishment of compulsory apprenticeships during the Industrial Revolution.
Engineering is a good example of where this approach would add value, as finding and training the engineers of the future needs to start early. A practical and interactive curriculum is key to generating enthusiasm amongst students who should have some understanding of an industry by the time they have to decide what they want to do for a career. We must reach back further into the education system by introducing initiatives that excite students about technical vocations earlier in their academic careers.
It is reassuring to see more private sector firms in the region taking on a greater responsibility towards the local community. Moreover, it could help ensure the population enjoys a more diverse range of skills that are relevant in a fast-growing region which needs local people for the industries that will power future growth.

Charlize Theron on marriage, gay marriage and the closets

Charlize Theron has decided marriage isn't for her, but still thinks anyone who does find the institution important should be allowed to marry.

Meanwhile, she worries her "bit of OCD" when it comes to closets might hurt her in the long-term-relationship department.

"I really want for myself a long-term relationship, and I have been in long-term relationships, and so ... that's the kind of union that I want," the actress said Wednesday on "Piers Morgan Tonight." "The actual ceremony is not something that's important to me."

Theron said in 2009 that she would not marry then-boyfriend Stuart Townsend unless same-sex marriage were made legal. After nine years together, she broke up with him in the wake of a Christmas 2010 trip to Mexico.

So, now that she's single -- there's the closet thing.

"I have a thing about things that are hidden," Theron said. "Like I will -- yes, I have a hard time, especially when I'm, like, renting a house if I'm working on a film and I don't know what's in all the -- I have to know what's in all the -- this is so pathetic. I cannot believe we're talking about this."

Pressed for details, she revealed that upon arrival in a new place, the first thing she does is inspect every closet and drawer. Then she has to put things where they belong, in a manner that allows access a certain way, and -- did she mention, Piers, that this is pathetic?

"Seriously, would you stop talking about it? Really beginning to freak me out now," she said. "I am single. I need to find a man. ... This is not going to help."

Somehow, we can't imagine it hurting that much either.