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Okay, but I don't really see it. A lot of heterosexuals I know date and sleep around in very short "relationships," and a lot of gay people I know date and sleep around in very short "relationships." Some of each end up settling down with a partner.

Well, despite that you've stretched the definition of relationship to basically include all encounters, the "some of each" is the deal breaker. "Some" for straights, is actually "most", and "some" for gays is just that, "some". The gay long-term relationships (for gay men) are also less likely to be monogamous.

Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that at any given time, more straight adults are in long-term relationship than are in short-term relationships.

Well, you restated what I said (long-term relationships constitute the majority of adult male-female relationships). In 2002, 52% of all people over the age of 15 were married.

"However, I think that the overall number of short relationships for the average individual is much larger than the overall number of long ones"

A woman dates, let's say, 6 different men in the span of time from high school til age 26. Those relationships could be a few dates, or a couple of years courtship. Anyway, guy number six hangs in there, and they get married. They stay married (and eventualy die).
So, duh, she's had more short term relationships than long term.

The real question though, is how do we see marrige-why do people get married, and why are/should there be benefits to that special relationship.
The basic answer, is family. There are legal ties and benefits (and liabilities), because marriage is not just 2 people shacking up for convenience. Marriage is a legal and moral lifetime commitment.

""Some" for straights, is actually "most", and "some" for gays is just that, "some". The gay long-term relationships (for gay men) are also less likely to be monogamous."

Sounds likely from anecdotal evidence, but this study sure didn't show it, and we don't really know the magnitude of the difference or the reason for it.

"Well, you restated what I said (long-term relationships constitute the majority of adult male-female relationships). In 2002, 52% of all people over the age of 15 were married. "

I didn't restate what you said -- I said something else that was more accurate. You could do the same thing by inserting the word "current" into your quote above, between the words "of" and "adult." It's a subtle difference, but a meaningful one. You can get statistics to say anything you want, depending on how you report them (as evidenced by the cited study).

"A woman dates, let's say, 6 different men in the span of time from high school til age 26. Those relationships could be a few dates, or a couple of years courtship. Anyway, guy number six hangs in there, and they get married. They stay married (and eventualy die).
So, duh, she's had more short term relationships than long term."

For purposes of critiquing this study, though, let's say that she's of an average age when the study took place -- perhaps 40. Let's say that her first four relationships lasted 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, and a year. Her marriage is 14 years long at the time of the study. That makes her average RELATIONSHIP 2.75 years long, or not so very different from the average relationship of those gay people in the study. This is why it makes no sense to compare "relationships" to "marriages" in such a study. The research on this issue is pretty low quality.