I discussed in a recent blog post, couples marrying today still face a substantial lifetime risk of
divorce. Even if the risk drops to around 40 percent, that’s a lot of divorce. However,
you are not a statistic, and you can do things that impact your likelihood of
lasting love in marriage. In this piece, I focus on those who are not yet
married but who want to be in the future. In a future piece, I’ll focus on
those already married who are concerned about their risk for divorce.
I will first share some factors
associated with higher risk for divorce and then describe specific strategies
for lowering that risk in your life.
Who Is at Greater
Risk for Divorcing?
In that
recent post on understanding the divorce rate, I reviewed some of the
complexities in understanding the average divorce risk. No matter which
estimate one uses, the fact is that there is a substantial risk for divorce in
marriage. While there are academic arguments about how great the average risk is, there is a lot less
argument among scholars about the relative
risks. Some people face a higher risk of divorce, and others a very low risk.
What follows is not an exhaustive list but it will hit the highlights.
Individual Characteristics Linked
with Higher Rates of Divorce:
- Marrying at a young age (e.g., marrying younger than 22)[i]
- Having less education (versus having a college degree)[ii]
- Having parents who divorced or who never married[iii]
- Having a personality that is more reactive to stress and emotion[iv]
- Having a prior marriage that ended[v]
- Prior to marrying, having sex with or cohabiting with someone other than your mate[vi]
- Having a very low income or being in poverty[vii]
- Having lower commitment to your mate and to a future together[viii]
Couple
Characteristics Linked with Higher Rates of Divorce:
While some people truly face a higher
risk of divorce than others, many people who have a very low risk nevertheless
worry about divorce happening to them. Some people avoid marriage because of their
fear of divorce, but avoiding marriage won’t really reduce one’s chances of
experiencing heartache and family instability. To really avoid the possibility
of such pain, one would need to avoid love, sex, and children altogether. For
some, avoiding marriage may actually increase their likelihood of experiencing the
very thing they fear—heartache and break-up—because marriage can be a potent
force for clarifying and reinforcing commitment between two people.
It’s useful to think about the
above list of risk factors in terms of which are dynamic, meaning potentially
changeable, and which are static, meaning not changeable.[xiii] We think this is so important, we've talked about this near the start of almost all our books (those co-authored by me, Howard Markman, and our colleagues). The reason is, no one can go back and change the
history of their parents’ marriage. Nor, when you are already married, can you
go back and change the history of things like if you cohabited prior to
engagement or had a child before marriage. But even with static risk factors,
there is good news. Those seemingly unchangeable risk factors are believed to
have their impact on your present life through other dimensions that are dynamic.
For example, although having parents who divorced seems to weaken adults’ views
of commitment in marriage,[xiv]
you can control your own beliefs about
marriage and your own level of commitment to your partner.
Advice for Those Not
Yet Married
If you
have not yet married or even chosen a partner, you have, by far, the most power
to affect your eventual likelihood of divorce. Those who are already married
can only change how they think and act in their existing marriage. Singles who
have not yet chosen a partner have a lot more that is still on the table for
change. In other words, your stage of life shapes what is dynamic and static in
terms of factors associated with your
risk for divorce. The earlier you are in the process of finding a mate, the
more your choices going forward can affect your future. Here are a few tips to
keep in mind as you proceed.
1. Take it slow. Get to know a person very
well before deciding to marry. We all know people who fell in love at first
sight and married within months, and who have done well over many years in
marriage. But there are many other couples who married fast and blew apart. By
taking more time, you can see how a potential partner treats others, responds
to stress, and handles disagreements with you on things that matter. Also, if your
relationship is moving toward marriage, take some time to clarify expectations
about marriage, family, and life. If you are not sure what to talk through, my
colleagues and I have chapters on expectations in most of our books, including
a detailed list of topics to talk through (e.g., here
and here).
2. Pay attention to
major red flags. If you see evidence of controlling or abusive behavior, or
serious substance use problems, don’t move blindly ahead hoping things will
work out. Love does not conquer all. If you have trusted friends or family,
listen to them about concerns they see in the person you are dating. Don’t
marry a makeover project—or, at the least, don’t do so until there is great
evidence of real, lasting change when there are concerns. And don’t move in
together to test such a relationship. That’s the worst reason you can have to
move in together.[xv]
3. Look for someone
who shares your beliefs and values. What are your central values in life? Are
they shared? Avoid situations where you might fall for someone prior to
determining these things. Once you sense some chemistry, it’s hard to hold onto
what had been non-negotiable for what you wanted in a mate. This is where
people can use online dating sites effectively: You can be clear about the big
things you are looking for in life before you meet someone and it gets all
complicated with chemistry. Chemistry is great. You want to have that. But chemistry
is best developed in a sequence, not as a blinding, binding glue in a
relationship you’d otherwise never have chosen.
4. Look for mutual dedication.
There should be sustained evidence that you and a prospective mate are
equally devoted to the relationship; for example, that you are both willing to make
sacrifices for each other. If you consistently think you are more dedicated to
the relationship than your partner, consider moving on. That’s a bad sign for future marital quality. It’s
fine to be looking for love, but it’s smarter to be looking for sacrifice. See here
for a specific example.
5. Don’t let
constraints for staying together increase before you establish mutual commitment
to be together. Many people slide into situations that make it harder to end
a relationship before they have made a clear decision about what is best. My
colleague Galena Rhoades and I believe that this is what many people do not see
about the risk of living together prior to marriage (or at least before
engagement). For too many couples, living together makes it harder to break up before it’s clear that they really have a future together. Here’s a four minute video describing this problem.
6. Do premarital training: This is an area of expertise with a very long history of work by me and my colleague Howard Markman. While marital experts debate everything, there is solid evidence that completing
premarital training (education, counseling, whatever it’s called) together can
improve your odds in marriage.[xvi]
Although this does not guarantee marital bliss, there is much more potential
upside than downside. The one downside I sometimes think about is actually an
upside: you could learn something concerning about your partner or relationship
that you didn't fully appreciate before--something that could lead you to get
more help or go slower. Because of this, I recommend that you seek premarital
training as far before a wedding date as possible. Why? Because the further in advance you
complete it, the more you have a chance to find out something that could lead
you to change your mind about marrying each other. I know I just lost a few of
you. But consider carefully why you just checked out. Instead of doing
something like living together, which has virtually no evidence of making
marriages more likely to succeed, do something that can inform your decision without
simultaneously making it harder to break up.
If you are likely to marry in a religious setting, contact that group and see if they provide premarital training. If not, check around to see if another group provides this service in a way that fits for the both of you. If you cannot find that, try a relationship education workshop if they exist in your community. Or, as another option, ask around about a local marital therapist who is skilled in helping couples prepare for marriage. If you don’t have any local options, there are online resources for assessing relationships before marriage (e.g., here) or for strengthening relationships (e.g., here, and here).
7. Be realistic about potential
mates. There are things I like about the concept of a soul-mate. For some
people, that means someone to share life with; someone at a deep level of
connection and perhaps of shared beliefs who can be a fellow traveler in life.
I have no problem with that. For others, however, the concept is dangerous:
what they really mean by “soul-mate” is a perfect lover who is ideal for them. Here’s
the risk in that: You may well marry someone you believe is your soul-mate, in
this extreme view of perfect love. But someday,
you will realize that this person is not perfect. You will get hurt. You will
be misunderstood or maybe even challenged about some of your imperfections.
Some
very sound marriages fail because one or both partners expected a level of
acceptance, passion, or perfection that is just not possible or is exceedingly
rare. That’s a real shame. What makes a great marriage is not two perfect
people aligning their lives, but two imperfect people transformed by a life of
commitment and love. Look for someone who can commit and grow and sacrifice, and
be that person to your eventual mate.
But I Am at High
Risk!
Perhaps you realize that you bring a high risk for divorce
to a marriage. Some people get dealt a worse hand in life, and you may have
been dealt a tough one. Further, individuals with a greater risk for divorce
are more likely to marry other individuals with greater risk for divorce. What
can you do? Consider the hand you were dealt and play that hand as well as you
can. Even just committing to my first suggestion above, to go slower, could
make a huge difference in your life and odds of divorcing. Marriage involves a
choice to risk loving another for life, but that is different from gambling
with your love life. Just make sure you are deciding rather than sliding your
way into your future.
Disclosure: I am
co-author of two books I referenced here, and I am a partner in the company
that publishes the online intervention, ePREP, that is linked as an online
resource. Since helping people improve their odds in marriage is my area of
specialty, it seemed unwise to avoid recommending anything that my colleagues
(such as Howard Markman) and I are associated with.
[i]
Glenn, N.D., Uecker, J.E., & Love, R.W.B. Jr. (2010). Later first marriage
and marital success. Social Science Research, 39, 787-800.; Teachman, J. D.
(2002). Stability across cohorts in divorce risk factors. Demography, 39,
331–351.
[ii]
Raley, R. K., & Bumpass, L. (2003).
The topography of the divorce plateau: Levels and trends in union
stability in the United States after 1980.
Demographic Research, 8, 245-260.; Wilcox, W. B., & Marquardt, E.
(2011). The State of Our Unions 2011:
Marriage in America. Charlottesville,
VA: The National Marriage Project. [See the box labeled: Your Chances of
Divorce May Be Much Lower than You Think]
[iii]
Amato, P. R. (2010). Research on Divorce: Continuing Trends and New Developments.
Journal of Marriage & Family, 72(3), 650-666.
[iv]
Kelly, E. L., & Conley, J. J. (1987). Personality and compatibility: A
prospective analysis of marital stability and marital satisfaction. Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 27 - 40.
[v]
Amato, P. R. (2010). Research on Divorce: Continuing Trends and New
Developments. Journal of Marriage & Family, 72(3), 650-666. ; Whitton, S.
W., Stanley, S. M., Markman, H. J., & Johnson, C. A. (2013). Attitudes toward divorce, commitment, and divorce
proneness in first marriages and remarriages.
Journal of Marriage and Family, 75, 276-287.
[vi]
Teachman, J. D. (2003). Premarital sex, premarital cohabitation, and the risk
of subsequent marital dissolution among women. Journal of Marriage and Family,
65(2), 444-455.
[vii]
Bramlett, M. D., & Mosher, W. D. (2002). Cohabitation, marriage, divorce,
and remarriage in the United States. Vital and Health Statistics, Series 23.
Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.
[viii]
Impett, E. A., Beals, K. P., & Peplau, L. A. (2001). Testing the investment
model of relationship commitment and stability in a longitudinal study of
married couples. Current Psychology,
20(4), 312-326.
[ix]
Tach, L., & Halpern-Meekin, S. (2009). How Does Premarital Cohabitation
Affect Trajectories of Marital Quality? Journal of Marriage & Family,
71(2), 298-317.
[x]
Stanley, S. M., Rhoades, G. K., Amato, P. R., Markman, H. J., & Johnson, C.
A. (2010). The timing of cohabitation and engagement: Impact on first and
second marriages. Journal of Marriage and Family, 72, 906-918.
[xi]
Gottman, J. (1994). What predicts
divorce? The relationship between marital process and marital outcomes.
Lawrence Erlbaum, New Jersey.; Clements, M. L., Stanley, S. M., & Markman,
H. J. (2004). Before they said "I do": Discriminating among marital
outcomes over 13 years based on premarital data. Journal of Marriage and
Family, 66, 613-626.
[xii]
Heaton, T. B. (2002). Factors
contributing to increasing marital stability in the United States. Journal of
Family Issues, 23, 392-409.
[xiii]
Stanley, S. M. (2001). Making a case for premarital education. Family
Relations, 50(3), 272-280. ; Markman, H. J., Stanley, S. M., & Blumberg, S.
L. (2010). Fighting for your marriage. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
[xiv]
Amato, P. R. & DeBoer, D. (2001). The transmission of divorce across
generations:
Relationship skills or commitment to marriage? Journal
of Marriage and Family, 63, 1038-1051.; see also Whitton, S. W., Rhoades, G.
K., Stanley, S. M., & Markman, H. J. (2008). Effects of parental divorce on
marital commitment and confidence. Journal of Family Psychology, 22, 789-793.
[xv]
Rhoades, G. K., Stanley, S. M., & Markman, H. J. (2009). Couples' reasons
for cohabitation: Associations with individual well-being and relationship
quality. Journal of Family Issues, 30, 233 - 258.
[xvi]
Carroll, J. S., & Doherty, W. J.
(2003). Evaluating the
effectiveness of premarital prevention programs: A meta-analytic review of
outcome research. Family Relations, 52,
105-118. ; Stanley, S. M., Amato, P. R.,
Johnson, C. A., & Markman, H. J. (2006). Premarital education, marital
quality, and marital stability: Findings from a large, random household survey.
Journal of Family Psychology, 20(1), 117-126.
