A psychological perspective: Marriage and the social provisions of relationships

Key Words: childrearing, cohabitation, marital therapy, marriage. The drive to establish connection and intimacy with another person is powerful. This is true among heterosexual and nonheterosexual people, among members of all ethnic and racial groups, and among persons at all levels on the socioeconomic ladder. This drive for connection and intimacy exists among those who want children and those who do not. It exists among those temperamentally suited to be good partners and those who are not. THE PROVISIONS OF SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS What do we seek in our quest for close connection with another? Robert Weiss (1974) described six different relationship provisions. It is useful to view these provisions as a starting point from which to consider the changes in the status of marriage so compellingly described in the invited papers in this issue. By focusing on the provisions that we gain from relationships, I shift the question from "Is the retreat from marriage good or bad?" to "In the context of the current retreat from marriage, how can people gain what they need from relationships?" The first provision described by Weiss (1974) is attachment, emotional bonding from which one derives security. The sexual bond may be included in this provision. The next is reassurance of worth, assurance that the individual is viewed as competent and as a person of value. The third provision is guidance, the availability of advice and information when it is needed. The fourth is reliable alliance, knowledge that the other can be trusted to provide help and tangible assistance in times of need. The fifth is social integration, a sense of shared values, interests, and companionship. The last is the opportunity to provide nurturance, being needed by another for love and care. The articles in this series document that people are pursuing these interpersonal goals outside the institution of marriage. One could argue that some people have retreated from marriage because it did not offer them one or more of Weiss's six relational provisions. For example, the high rates of divorce undermine perceptions of marriage as a source of attachment security. Traditional gendered marital roles that placed women in a subservient position deprived women of reassurance of worth (Oropesa & Landale, 2004). In past generations, greater rewards were provided for performing the roles of wife and mother, but in the current context, less value is placed upon these roles (Cherlin, 2004). Other sources of reassurance of worth, such as achievement in the workplace, may be viewed as less available for women within the confines of marriage. For low-income women, the changing structure of the labor market and the decrease in high-paying production jobs made it difficult to find men who offered reliable alliance in the form of regular contributions to household income (Huston & Melz, 2004; Oropesa & Landale). For low-income men, lack of employment opportunities may highlight their inability to support a family, depriving them of self-respect and reassurance of worth from their partner. According to Huston and Melz (2004), marriage is viewed as more self-defining than cohabitation. Marriage represents a public statement regarding one's identity. Thus, gaps in social provisions offered by a marriage may be viewed as more significant than the same gaps in the context of cohabitation. When they are not married, people may define themselves less in relation to their partners and more in relation to their own merits and assets. Marriage is a more binding union than cohabitation (Cherlin, 2004). A cohabiting individual may still be seeking the "SuperRelationship" with a true soul mate described by Cherlin. WHAT ABOUT CHILDREN? The needs of children cannot be neglected in a discussion of the extent to which marriage meets important human needs. Weiss's six provisions are also useful as a way of thinking about what children need from their families. …