Why Marriage Matters: 26 Conclusions from the Social Sciences - Part 1

familyscholars.org

Does it matter if couples get and stay married? In Why Marriage Matters, a diverse group of leading family scholars summarizes the findings on the difference that marriage makes.

Family Matters

  1. Marriage increases the likelihood that fathers and mothers have good relationships with their children.

  2. Cohabitation is not the same as marriage. Cohabiting couples on average are less committed, less faithful, and more likely to break up than married couples.

  3. Growing up outside an intact marriage increases the likelihood that children will themselves divorce or become unwed parents.

  4. In almost every known human society, marriage exists as a way of regulating the reproduction of children, families, and society.

  5. Marriage typically fosters better romantic and parental relationships compared to other family forms, such as cohabitation. Individuals who have a firm commitment to marriage as an ideal are more likely to invest themselves in their marriage and to enjoy happier marriages.

  6. Marriage has important biological consequences for adults and children. For instance, marriage appears to reduce men's testosterone levels, and girls who grow up in an intact, married family appear to have a relatively later onset of puberty.

Economics Matters

 7. Divorce and unmarried childbearing increase poverty for both children and mothers.

  8. Married couples seem to build more wealth on average than singles or cohabiting couples.

  9. Marriage reduces poverty and material hardship (for example, missing a meal or failing to pay rent) for disadvantaged women and their children.

 10. African Americans and Latinos benefit economically from marriage.

 11. Married men earn more money than do single men with similar education and job histories.

 12. Parental divorce (or failure to marry) appears to increase children's risk of dropping out of high school.

 13. Parental divorce reduces the likelihood that children will graduate from college and achieve high-status jobs.

(Part 2, Numbers 14-26 tomorrow)

This summary is adapted from Why Marriage Matters: Twenty-Six Conclusions from the Social Sciences, 2nd edition, a publication of the Center for Marriage and Families at the Institute for American Values. The Institute is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that brings together approximately 100 leading scholars-from across the human sciences and across the political spectrum-for interdisciplinary deliberation, collaborative research, and joint public statements on the challenges facing families and civil society. To obtain the original edition of Why Marriage Matters visit www.familyscholars.org.

PDF file of 26 Conclusions 

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God bless your family and your marriage.

Jim Stephens