The case for (promoting) marriage: The devil is in the details

This article considers the quality of the evidence that marriage confers unique benefits, and that, as such, social policies should be enacted to encourage couples, particularly those with few economic resources, to get married and stay together. Public concern about the future of marriage in the United States, we show, is rooted in demographic changes that reflect not so much a turning away from marriage, but an increasing openness to postponing marriage, living together out of wedlock, or divorcing. We examine why people who are motivated to marry hold back from doing so when they see the warning signs of future problems, and what happens when they marry despite them. We argue that marriages are fashioned in the images of the partners and are shaped by the opportunities and constraints of the ecological settings in which they are situated. As such, the promotion of family health and stability will require an approach that attends to couples' psychological, social, and economic needs. Key Words: courtship, divorce, marriage, mate selection, social policy, welfare policy. One of the most contentious debates in the United States today centers on the concern that some social critics have that, as a society, we are turning away from the institution of marriage. Though American families have been in transition for as long as there have been American families (Coontz, 1992), the normative context for family formation has shifted over the last several decades in four important ways: (a) nonmarital cohabitation is being practiced more visibly and more widely across our social spectrum; (b) the proportion of births that occur outside marriage has increased dramatically; (c) people marry later in life; and (d) divorce has settled in at a high rate. These phenomena have broad implications for adult lifestyles, childbearing, and childrearing. Social scientists, legal scholars, family advocates, and pundits have examined the causes and consequences of the changing shape of American families. A growing consensus exists that being raised in a well-functioning two-parent family is generally good for children (Amato & Booth, 1997; McLanahan & Sandefur, 1994), and the declining proportion of two-parent married families is seen by some as a crisis in need of intervention (e.g., Popenoe, 1999). Some scholars have argued that the benefits of marriage over other lifestyles are manifold (see, e.g., Waite & Gallagher, 2000; Wilson, 2002), and policymakers have recently considered federal legislation to promote and protect the institution. This article sets forth our thoughts about these issues. Our goal is cautionary. Our concern is not that ideology has infused the public debate about the future of marriage, but rather that the dialogue has not been adequately tempered by social scientists applying their trade as steadfastly as they should. We begin by posing a series of questions, each of which we believe needs to be addressed thoughtfully, both by social scientists whose job description centers on gathering and critically evaluating relevant data, and by the general public, who digest our interpretations of the data, inevitably filtering them through their own value systems and testing them against their own experiences. We present evidence that should encourage people to move beyond the tacit assumption that their own experiences are widely shared and, instead, to be mindful of the diverse circumstances under which people delay marriage, dissolve marriage, or choose not to marry at all. Attention to these devilish details, we believe, is the key to the development of social policies that effectively promote family health and stability. IS MARRIAGE RIGHT FOR Us ALL AND ALWAYS? Let us consider some questions to which many of us offer differing answers. * Is the proposition that marriage is good for people grounded securely enough in research to justify promoting marriage over other adult lifestyles? …