Family Facts: Social Science Research on Family, Society & Religion
Top Ten Findings
The Benefits of Marriage
June 2006
1. Married couples report greater sexual satisfaction. The highest levels of sexual satisfaction were reported by individuals who were in married, monogamous relationships, while those who were single or cohabiting reported slightly lower levels of sexual satisfaction.
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2. Married women report higher levels of physical and psychological health. On average, married women reported the best physical and psychological health. Formerly married women reported the worst health while never-married women fell between these two groups. Compared with unmarried women, married women had less job stress, environment stress, child stress, financial stress, and relationship stress. Health measures included self-rated health, distress level, chronic illness, and a number of stress types, ranging from social life stress to job strain.
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3. Married people are more likely to volunteer. "Married adults were 1.3 times more likely than unmarried adults to have volunteered [for social service], and married adults averaged 1.4 times more volunteer hours than unmarried individuals." In addition, parents were also twice as likely as childless adults to volunteer for social service.
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4. Being married increases the likelihood of affluence. Being married increased the likelihood of attaining affluence among people of all age groups.
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5. Married people experience less depression. Married people had considerably less depression and fewer problems with alcohol than did unmarried people. Men who married and stayed married were less depressed than those who remained single. Among women, marriage was associated with fewer alcohol problems.
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6. Getting married increases the probability of moving out of a poor neighborhood. Marrying nearly doubled the probability that a person would move from a poor to a non-poor neighborhood. Likewise, the dissolution of a marriage more than doubled the probability that a person would move from a non-poor to poor neighborhood. Among blacks, marital dissolution increased the likelihood of moving from a non poor to a poor neighborhood almost six-fold.
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7. Married men make more money. Compared with peers who are not married, married men earn a 20% higher wage, even when controlling for such factors as educational attainment.
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8. Married women are less likely to experience poverty. Marital status is strongly and significantly correlated with the likelihood of being impoverished. Compared to never-married peers, women who had ever been married were substantially less likely to be poor—regardless of race, family background, non-marital births, or education. Ever-married women have a poverty rate that was roughly one-third lower than the poverty rate of never-married women. Currently married women had an even lower probability of living in poverty—about two-thirds lower than other women.
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9. Those who have never been married have nearly twice the mortality risk of those who are married. Individuals who had never been married had nearly twice the mortality risk of those who were married. Those who were divorced or separated ran a mortality risk more than 50 percent higher than those who were married. The black-white mortality gap narrowed when marital status was taken into account.
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Resources
Events:Religious Practice and Civic Life: What the Research Says October 4, 2007 |