Scott M. Stanley and Galena K. Rhoades
The CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) put
out a
report in May on
the demographics of cohabitation, with interesting contrasts among adults who
are cohabiting, married, or neither. The report is based on a large, representative,
national survey of U.S. adults aged 18 to 44, sampled between 2011 and 2015. To
conduct the analyses, the authors (Nugent and Daugherty) selected only adults
who had sexual intercourse with a partner of the opposite sex. They did that to
ensure the groups were comparable in some respects regarding their histories in
intimate relationships. The groups reflect those who were currently cohabiting,
married, or neither at the time of being surveyed.
Cohabitation,
Marriage, or Neither
The report shows that, as of 2015:
- 17.1% of women and 15.9% of men were cohabiting
- 44.9% of women and 43.5% of men were married
- 38.0% of women and 40.6% of men were unmarried, and
not cohabiting
This type of data does not address pathways over time, such
as how many among the current cohabiters will eventually marry or how many of
those not currently residing with a partner will eventually do either or
neither. However, the data do provide estimates of the number of times people
in the groups had cohabited outside of marriage up to the time they were surveyed.
Sixty-seven percent (67%) of those currently married had
cohabited before marriage with one or more partners.
[i]
Many of those currently unmarried or not cohabiting had cohabited before.
Fifty-one (51.4%) of the women in that group had lived with one or more
partners before, and 42.9% of the men had done likewise. Doing a little math, we
estimate from the report that 64.5% of the entire sample has cohabited with a
romantic partner at some point outside of marriage. That’s not the percent of
people sampled who will cohabit outside of marriage at some point in their
lives, though. The lifetime percent for this group would, of course, be higher.
To get that number, you’d have to follow everyone in the sample until each person
had either cohabited or died. That could be a long wait. (It might be that
Facebook could eventually tell us those numbers.)
The data on premarital cohabitation history in this sample
will be an under-estimate because the marrieds make up a higher percentage of
the older people in that age range, and there is every reason to believe that
the youngest, non-marrieds in the sample are more likely to cohabit prior to
marriage than those who are older. Other estimates not based on this specific
report are that the percentage of people living together before tying the knot is
now at an all-time high of over 70%.
[ii]
We believe this figure will go higher still. There remain some groups,
particularly the more traditionally religious,
[iii]
who will not live together before marriage, but otherwise, cohabitation is
common and there is little stigma associated with it.
Thus, a very high percentage of people in the U.S. cohabit
outside of marriage. It is now normative behavior. Wendy Manning
has
estimated that, “The percentage of women ages 19-44 who have ever
cohabited has increased by 82% over the past 23 years.” For those aged 30-34 in
2009-10, she has shown that
73%
of women had already cohabited with someone. If you combine such
numbers with the fact that, as Susan Brown has shown, there is a steady
increase in cohabitation among older adults (after the death of a spouse or
divorce),
[iv]
it is easy to imagine that the number of people who will eventually cohabit
outside of marriage could reach 80%, or more.
Cohabitation has greatly increased in large measure because,
while people are delaying marriage to ever greater ages, they are not delaying
sex, living together, or childbearing. In fact, on the latter point, Manning
noted in her recent address to the Population Association of America that
almost all of the
increase in
non-marital births in the U.S. since 1980 has taken place in the
context of cohabiting unions.
Cohabiting with more than one partner outside of marriage
has also gone steadily higher.
[v]
The NCHS report does not demonstrate the trend, but the data reported do show that
44% of the currently-cohabiting group and 20% of the neither cohabiting nor
married group has already lived with
two
or more partners. Ever higher levels of serial cohabitation mean that more
people are on one of the pathways strongly associated with risks for family
instability or divorce.
[vi]
Prior research has shown that serial cohabitation is strongly associated with
economic disadvantage among unmarried couples,
[vii]
lower odds of marriage, and increased odds of poor marital outcomes, but serial
cohabitation is growing rapidly among different population groups.
[viii]
Increasing rates of cohabitation as well as serial
cohabitation might be of no special consequence except for the point noted above,
that many births now occur in cohabiting unions. Some percentage of these
couples have a long-term commitment similar to marriage, but, on average,
cohabiting parents are much more likely than married parents to break up,
[ix]
resulting in increasing odds of family instability for children. Much of this
risk is due to selection, a subject we will come to below.
Other Characteristics
of these Groups
Other findings from the NCHS report are consistent with the
way that basic family patterns have increasingly diverged around cultural,
educational, and economic lines. For example:
- 47.9% of cohabiting women had household incomes
less than 150% of the federal poverty line compared to 25.6% of married women
- 36.1% cohabiting men had incomes less than 150%
of the federal poverty line compared to 21.2% of married men
- 25.2% cohabiting women had incomes over 300% of the
federal poverty line compared to 48.1% of marrieds
- 32.4% of cohabiting men had incomes over 300% of
the federal poverty line compared to 52.4% of marrieds
This is one of the more striking examples of the fact that a
lot of cohabiting women and men tend to be poor compared to married women and
men. The data on education follow the same pattern, of course. Married people
had the most education followed by those who are not married or cohabiting,
with cohabiting people reporting lower levels of education than the other two groups.
For example:
- 25.3% of cohabiting women had a bachelor’s
degree compared to 43% of married women
- 16.2% of cohabiting men had a bachelor’s degree
compared to 36.5% of married men
While the education levels of many of the cohabiters in this
sample will go higher over time, the findings from many studies show that cohabitation
(particularly with cohabiting relationships not leading directly to marriage) is
associated with being more disadvantaged, on average.
[x]
The data are consistent with the story of a class divide around marriage and
cohabitation.
[xi]
Attitudes and
Experiences
This NCHS report also presents differences in the three groups
based on attitudes and experiences about unmarried sex, cohabitation, and
having children outside of marriage. Not surprisingly, both of the non-married
groups are less traditional in their views than those who are married. These
findings are reflected in the table below from the report. [click on it to view it]
While there are clear differences, large majorities of every
group believe that having and raising children without being married is fine; this
is endorsed by the greatest number of cohabiters. Of course, that finding would
have been quite different decades ago. Marrieds are the most disapproving of
cohabitation outside of marriage, but even most of the married group agreed
that it is all right to do so.
Majorities of every group also believe that living together
before marriage may help prevent divorce. This is of particular interest to us
given our research related to this question.
[xii]
The percentage believing this was highest for those currently cohabiting.
This notion has had wide acceptance since at least the mid-1990s,
when three-fifths of high school students believed that, “It is usually a good
idea for a couple to live together before getting married in order to find out
whether they really get along.”
[xiii]
It is worth noting that there is virtually no evidence in support of this
belief. However, it is also fair to note that there used be a lot clearer
evidence to the contrary.
Regardless, we believe that there is considerable evidence
that some patterns of living together before marriage are associated with increased
risks for less successful marriages. We do think experiences and choices matter
for future outcomes. This assertion is mildly controversial among those who
study cohabitation. To be sure, there is a mountain of evidence for selection
in both who cohabits and who will cohabit in the riskier ways. What that means
is that people who are already at greater risk for worse outcomes in
relationships because of things like family background, disadvantage, or
individual vulnerabilities are also more likely to do any of the following: cohabit
and not marry, cohabit before having clear, mutual plans to marry, or cohabit
with a number of different partners over time. There is plenty of evidence of
other patterns in the NCHS report related to cohabiters being more select for
various relationship risks. Consider the following findings.
Relationship Risks Associated with Cohabitation
Cohabiters were more likely (74%) than those currently
married (56%) to have had sexual intercourse before the age of 18. Cohabiting
women were also more likely to report ever having an unintended birth (43.5%) compared
to married women (23.9%). These types of patterns are associated with life-long
risk factors already present in the lives of many people. Of course, you could
argue that such differences also reflect choices people make that have
potentially causal, life-altering consequences. Such debates are endless, but
we do not doubt a huge role for selection in all of this. And yet, we believe there
often are causal elements impacting life outcomes related to the experience of
cohabitation.
First, it has been shown that cumulative cohabiting experience
changes peoples’ beliefs about marriage.
[xiv]
While that research is older, the theory behind the research is compelling. Much
research shows we learn from experiences and experiences change our beliefs. We
believe that the increase in cohabitation, serial cohabitation, and premarital
cohabitation has led to consistent downward trends in belief that marriage is special.
Second, cohabitation makes it harder to break up, net of
everything else. Because of the
inertia
of living together, some people get stuck longer than they otherwise would in
relationships they might have left or left sooner. In fact, we believe some
people marry someone they would otherwise have left because cohabitation made
it too hard to move on. Inertia should be the greatest problem for couples who
had not decided beforehand on their future, such as by already having mutual
plans to marry (e.g., engagement) or, of course, by first marrying. While the
increased risk can be modest, the prediction is consistently supported with at
least
seven
reports using six different samples, showing that those who start
cohabiting before deciding to marry report lower average marital quality and
are more likely to divorce.
[xv]
This added risk is compounded by the fact that most couples slide into
cohabiting rather than make a clear decisions about what it means and what
their futures may hold.
[xvi]
Third, cohabitation is increasingly a context for childbearing.
Since cohabiting parental unions are relatively unstable, the
increasing
number of couples
who
break up in such unions will mean more people entering future
relationships with the challenge of children in tow.
Complexity Abounds
These ever-changing patterns in relationship and family
development are complex, and they do not operate in the same way for all. For
example, there is
research
suggesting that cohabiting experiences may lead to more positive attitudes
about marriage among young, African American adults. More broadly, as Sharon
Sassler and Amanda Miller argue in
Cohabitation
Nation, there are various social class disparities that impact
things like if and how soon a person will move in with a partner. Some pathways
will lead to different sets of outcomes for different people, and some people
have more ability (economic and personal) to avoid paths that increase the odds
of poor outcomes.
[xvii]
The extraordinary changes of the past four decades reflect
how ordinary cohabitation has become. There is no a simple story here, only an
ever-unfolding one of increasingly complex families.
[i] It
cannot be determined from these data if this means that 67% would have
cohabited before marriage with their spouse, but presumably, that is a
reasonable estimate for those doing so.
[ii]
Hemez, P. & Manning, W. D. (2017).
Thirty
years of change in women's premarital cohabitation experience.
Family Profiles, FP-17-05. Bowling Green, OH: National Center for Family &
Marriage Research. That’s for the United States, but the rates are similarly
high in all industrialized nations. In a recent address to the Population
Association of America, I believe Manning put that number at around 75%.
[iii] There
is a nuance here for this new report. The group that is excluded by the
selection criteria (about having had sexual intercourse with someone of the
opposite sex) are those in that age range who have neither married nor had
sexual intercourse up to this point in their lives. Because of that, the
estimate of 67% living together before marriage for this particular age range
at that point in history would be a little high. We cannot say how high but do
not doubt that the percent who will live together before marriage of the current
generation of young adults is now over 70%.
[viii]
Ibid Lichter et al. (2010).
[ix] “Only
one out of three children born to cohabiting parents remains in a stable family
through age 12, in contrast to nearly three out of four children born to
married parents.”: Manning, W. D. (2015).
Cohabitation
and child wellbeing. The Future of Children, 25(2), 51–66; see also McLanahan,
S., & Beck, A. N. (2010). Parental relationships in fragile families. The
Future of Children, 20(2), 17-37.; McLanahan, S., & Beck, A. N. (2010).
Parental
relationships in fragile families. The Future of Children, 20(2),
17-37.
[x] It
is important to note that this type of data also cannot distinguish between
cohabiters who will transition into marriage with their current (or a future) cohabiting
partner and those who will not.
[xii] If you want to dig in pretty deeply on theory
and research from us on this subject, you can start
here
or
here,
and find summaries and links to many (non-gated) papers you can read if you
like.
[xv]
In addition to the list of the body of studies on the marriage-plans-timing
effect (partial list following, full list
here),
a recent study shows that relationship quality is highest (on average) for
marrieds and lowest for cohabiting couples without plans to marry, with marrieds
who cohabited before marriage and cohabiters who currently had plans in between
those two groups: Brown, S., Manning, W. D., & Payne, K. K. (2017).
Relationships
quality among cohabiting versus married couples.
Journal of Family Issues, 38, 1730 – 1753. (First appeared in
advance online publication in 2015:
https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513X15622236);
Examples of studies with the engagement/plans timing effect: Kline, G. H.,
Stanley, S. M., Markman, H. J., Olmos-Gallo, P. A., St. Peters, M., Whitton, S.
W., & Prado, L. (2004).
Timing is everything:
Pre-engagement cohabitation and increased risk for poor marital outcomes.
Journal of Family Psychology, 18,
311-318.; Rhoades, G. K., Stanley, S. M., & Markman, H. J. (2009).
The
pre-engagement cohabitation effect: A replication and extension of previous
findings. J
ournal of Family
Psychology, 23, 107-111.; 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 & Family, 72,
906-918.
[xvi]
See Lindsay, J. M. (2000, online version came out in 2014).
An ambiguous
commitment: Moving into a cohabiting relationship.
Journal of Family Studies, 6(1),
120-134.; Manning, W. D., & Smock, P. J. (2005).
Measuring
and modeling cohabitation: New perspectives from qualitative data.
Journal of Marriage & Family, 67,
989 - 1002.; Stanley, S. M., Rhoades, G. K., & Fincham, F. D. (2011).
Understanding romantic relationships among emerging adults: The significant
roles of cohabitation and ambiguity. In F. D. Fincham & M. Cui (Eds.),
Romantic relationships in emerging adulthood (pp. 234-251). New York: Cambridge
University Press.
