Examined relationship between cohabitation and marital instability among U.S. women born between 1928 and 1957. Although cohabitation was generally associated with higher risks of marital dissolution, differential was much smaller (or reversed) in recent cohorts where cohabitation was more common. Association between cohabitation and marital…

This article uses data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 Cohort Mother-Child files to explore the idea that child well-being can be improved by encouraging and enhancing parental marriage. I consider how children's living arrangements, the stability of parental marriages, and changes in living arrangements are related to…

Tested two hypotheses relative to duration of marriage in 11,559 divorcing families in northern California. Confirmed that the presence of children is associated with longer marriage duration but not that the presence of children younger than age two was associated with longer marital duration. (NRB)

It is apparent that many adults do not want the job of parenthood, yet they are socially pressured to have children. (MM)

Examines the role of premarital cohabitation as a determinant of cohabitation after marital disruption. The author proposed that people who cohabitated prior to first marriage were more likely to cohabitate after marital disruption than those who did not. It was found that the hazard rate of postmarital cohabitation was over 50% higher for…

Used data from National Survey of Families and Households to examine cohabitation. Couples who cohabited before marriage reported lower quality marriages, lower commitment to institution of marriage, more individualistic views of marriage (wives only), and greater likelihood of divorce than couples who did not cohabit. Effects were generally…

Studied 73 couples twice 4 years apart. Proposed typology of five groups of couples (validators, volatiles, avoiders, hostile, and hostile/detached) based on observational data of Time 1 resolution of conflict, specific affects, and affect sequences. Over four years, groups differed significantly in serious consideration of divorce and in…

Premarital cohabitation has consistently been found to be associated with increased risk for divorce and marital distress in the United States. Two explanations for this "cohabitation effect" are discussed: selection and experience. We present an empirically based view of how the experience of cohabitation may increase risk for…

Distressed and nondistressed couples held discussions of their major marital problem. Mismatch errors or differences in intent and impact were most likely to occur when the receiver of the message evaluated the message more negatively than it was intended regardless of the group. The results provide some support for both the semantic and…

Examines the relationship between premarital cohabitation and marital dysfunction a sample spouses in two marriage cohorts: those married between 1964 and 1980 (when cohabitation was less common) and those married between 1981 and 1997 (when cohabitation was more common). Spouses in both cohorts who cohabited prior to marriage reported poorer…

Examined prevalence and determinants of stable unhappy marriage using data from national survey. Results indicated age, lack of prior marital experience, commitment to marriage as an institution, low social activity, lack of control over one's life, and belief that divorce would detract from happiness were all predictive of stability in unhappy…

Compared conflictual marital interactions of 17 physically aggressive, 15 verbally aggressive, 18 withdrawing, and 15 low-conflict couples to describe behavior patterns characteristic of couples who report different marital conflict styles. Physically aggressive couples were characterized by reciprocity of hostile affect and by rigid, contingent…

Professionals generally believe that couples who choose to attend marriage education programs are not as distressed as are clinical couples and that distressed couples are not good candidates for marriage education. We examined these assumptions in 129 married couples who enrolled in a PAIRS, Practical Application of Intimate Relationship Skills…

Guided by a life course perspective, this study investigated whether the psychological consequences of transitioning into a caregiver role for a biological parent, parent-in-law, spouse, other kin, or nonkin among married adults might be moderated by marital role quality. Using longitudinal data from a national sample of 1,842 married adults aged…