An ongoing question remains for family researchers: Why does a positive association between cohabitation and marital dissolution exist when one of the primary reasons to cohabit is to test relationship compatibility? Drawing on recently collected data from the 2006-2008 National Survey of Family Growth, the authors examined whether premarital…

Secondary respondent data are underutilized because researchers avoid using these data in the presence of substantial missing data. The authors reviewed, evaluated, and tested solutions to this problem. Five strategies of dealing with missing partner data were reviewed: (a) complete case analysis, (b) inverse probability weighting, (c) correction…

Much research has argued for the existence of a marriage benefit to men, women, and children. Although the commonly suggested current response to a husband's violence has been for the couple to separate, traditionally women were often told to "stay for the children." This paper uses the Project on Human Development in Chicago…

This report examines whether the presence of children in marriage differentially influences the risk of wives or husbands initiating separation. The analytic sample consists of 9,118 first marriages from the Households, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia survey (2001). Using event history and competing risks analysis, I find weak evidence…

As the number of people choosing to marry has plunged during recent decades, the tally of children living with one parent and having limited or no contact with the other has soared. Attuned to the hazards that such separations impose upon children but also upon parents who, studies show, fare physically and emotionally better in a thriving…

The authors used data from the Add Health study to estimate the effects of parents' marital status and relationship distress on daughters' early family formation transitions. Outcomes included traditional transitions (marriage and marital births) and nontraditional transitions (cohabitation and nonmarital births). Relationship distress among…

This study deals with the relationship between number and spacing of children and family role structure as measured by decision making and household task performance. Data on childbearing patterns and family role structure indicate that family size, spacing between marriage and first birth, and spacing between first and last birth are all related…

Compares reported levels of marital quality, marital stability, and the marital processes of cohesion, flexibility, and communication in the marriages of nontraditional and traditional women. Results indicated many similarities between the two groups; however, nontraditional women reported greater flexibility in their marriages. Implications of…

Examines the use of the often quoted remarriage studies done in the 1950s and found that extreme caution should be used in presentations where redivorce is discussed. The traditional family form may not be in as much of a decline as some report. (Author)

A strongly positive opinion of spouse in middle age tends to be associated with social conformity and family integration. Mutually approving couples were more often politically moderate, homogamous in religious background, and had more interpersonal power than their children. They also had more highly integrated family structures with low conflict…

The failure of family life is traced to its complex dependence on the capitalist corporate order and the particular sex-based division of labor that is a product of that order. Particular emphasis is given to the woman's special responsibility for the emotional life of her spouse and children. (Author)

Used national longitudinal data to examine parent-child relationships before and after divorce. Parental reports of relationship problems with children were significantly elevated as early as 12 years prior to divorce. Findings suggest that the quality of the parents' marriage has both direct and indirect long-term consequences for parent-child…

Found an excess mortality, especially among women, among people who are remarried and cohabiting. A narrower than expected gender mortality difference existed when work status and number of children were taken into consideration. Unemployed women, as well as unskilled male workers, were in particularly vulnerable situations at divorce. (RJM)

Studied no-fault divorce law effects on the divorce rate. Results revealed that no-fault divorce laws led to measurable increases in divorce rates. Median family income was the only significant predictor of change in divorce rate; the adjusted post-no-fault divorce rate increased as median family income increased. (RJM)

Examines whether the rising percentage of unmarried adults would affect the level of social support between adult children and their parents. The only major effect found was for coresidence. Neither divorced children in general nor divorced daughters or divorced single parents in particular posed a special burden to parents. (RJM)