The Petraeus and Broadwell families can take comfort in one thing this too shall pass. The TV trucks will depart. The photographers will zip up their eq. The Decline of Marriage And Rise of New Families III. Marriage. About fourinten Americans think that marriage is on the rocks. No, not their marriage. QT-Choose-Words-Well.jpg' alt='Love Marriage Divorce Download Zip' title='Love Marriage Divorce Download Zip' />III. Marriage Pew Research Center. November 1. 8, 2. About four in ten Americans think that marriage is on the rocks. No, not their marriage. The institution of marriage. In response to the question, Some people say that the present institution of marriage is becoming obsoletedo you agree or disagree some 3. As family historians have noted, observations about the fragility of marriage are as old and universal as marriage itselfmeaning theyve been around for thousands of years and permeated virtually every culture and corner of the globe. Nevertheless, theres been a notable rise in recent decades in this country in the perception that marriages best days are behind it. When this same question was posed on a 1. No matter what one thinks about the institutions future, theres no getting around its stark contraction during the past half century. Some 7. 2 of all adults in the United States were married in 1. By 2. 00. 8, just 5. Does this trend line lead inevitably to obsolescence The notion that it does attracts some strange bedfellowsthose who are contributing to the phenomenon 5. The survey reveals other intriguing cross currents in the publics attitudes about marriage. For example, most Americans now embrace the ideal of gender equality between spouses. The mid 2. 0th century Ozzie and Harriet marriage between a breadwinner husband and a homemaker wife is now seen as the preferred model by just 3. Even as public opinion embraces the ideal of spousal equality, however, it still hasnt given up the seemingly contradictory notion that menfar more than womenneed to be good providers in order to be good marriage prospects. Two thirds of survey respondents say this about men, while just one third say it about women. But comes now another wrinkle. To hear the public tell it, financial security isnt all that important to marriage. Asked to evaluate the reasons they got married, married respondents place the greatest value on love 9. Unmarried adults order the reasons the same way when asked to evaluate why they would consider getting married. The potency of the link between love and marriage is relatively new in the sweep of human historyand, in the view of some historians, a leading cause of the institutions decline. For several millennia, economic security was the sine qua non of marriage. The institution thrived as an efficient way to divide labor, allocate resources, propagate the species and ensure that someone will take care of you when you get old. Only in recent centuries have love and mutual self fulfillment come to occupy center stage in the grand marital bargain. But as the trends of the past half century attest, its an open question whether a social institution built on love will prove as durable as one built on economic security. Less Money, Less Marriage. If economic security is no longer a key reason people marry, the lack of economic security nonetheless appears to be a key reason people dont get married. As noted in the overview of this report, 5. By 2. 00. 8, that small gap had widened to a chasm 6. During this same period, the income gap between the well educated and the less educatedand between the rich and pooralso widened substantially. The 2. 01. 0 Pew Research survey finds that among the unmarried, there are no significant differences by education or income in the desire to get married just under half of the college educated 4. Likewise, roughly similar shares of the unmarried who earn above and below 1. But the survey also finds that the less education and income people have, the more likely they are to say that in order to be a good marriage prospect, a person must be able to support a family financially. Taken together, these findings suggest that those with less income and education are opting out of marriage not because they dont value the institution or aspire to it benefits, but because they may doubt that they or a potential spouse can meet the standards they impose on marriage. The Upsides of Marriage. Not all of the survey findings are harbingers of gloom and doom for the institution of marriage. Even among those who are not currently married, getting hitched continues to have appeal. A plurality of 4. Just one in four say they dont want to marry. Moreover, marriage may have been more prevalent a generation ago, but most married or cohabiting respondents today believe their own relationship compares favorably with their parents. Some 5. 1 say they have a closer relationship with their spouse or partner than their parents had with each other, while just 5 characterize their own relationship as less close. The remainder4. 3say there is no difference. A majority of adults believe that in many key realms of lifesuch as finding happiness, getting ahead in a career or having social statusit doesnt make any difference whether a person is married or single. However, among those who believe it does make a difference, most say that being married is better. For example, when it comes to being financially secure, 3. Similar patterns emerge for having a fulfilling sexual life, finding happiness and having social status. The two outliers from this pattern are raising a family fully 7. Finally, a classic question about love was posed in the survey Do you agree or disagree that there is only one true love for each person Nearly three in ten 2. Americans agree, while 6. Among the minority who believe in just one true love, 7. And among those in this group who are married, 9. The remainder of this chapter examines all of these questions in depth and explores the demographic patterns in attitudes and behaviors related to marriage. Is Marriage Becoming Obsolete Its no small thing when nearly four in ten 3. Americans agree that the worlds most enduring social institution is becoming obsolete. Nonetheless, this finding needs to be interpreted with caution. For one thing, becoming obsolete is not the same as obsolete. When the World Values Survey posed a similar question in 2. Marriage is an outdated institutionagree or disagree, just 1. American respondents agreed. In addition, respondents who doubt the durability of marriage appear to include a mix of those who are comfortable with the change and those who are troubled by it. Among the demographic groups most likely to agree that marriage is becoming obsolete are the young 4. All of these groups are less likely than their demographic opposites older, white, college educated, higher income to be marriedand thus their judgments could well be shaped to some degree by their life experiences. These differences come into sharper focus when one looks specifically at respondents marital status. Just 3. 1 of married adults agree that marriage is becoming obsolete, compared with 4. Qualitative Research Examples Pdf Programs. But its not just those who are living out alternative arrangements to marriage who say that the institution is becoming obsolete. Some 4. 2 of self described conservatives compared with 3. They are also the most likely of the three ideology groups to say that the growing variety in family arrangements is a bad thing. Gender Roles Family Finances. When it comes to attitudes about how spouses should divide responsibilities, social norms have changed. Back in 1. 97. 7, survey respondents were nearly equally divided between those who said marriages are more satisfying when the husband earns an income and the wife takes care of the household and children 4.