Welcome to this week’s UK Marriage
News
Headlines
·
Final vote on Marriage and Civil
Partnership (Scotland) Bill on Tuesday
·
New government report shows couple
counselling and marriage preparation services deliver over £11 benefit for every
£1 spent
·
Marriage Week aims to break world
record for wedding vow renewal!
Government
and Political
·
Final vote on Marriage and Civil
Partnership (Scotland) Bill on Tuesday
MSPs
have their final chance to vote for amendments to the Marriage Bill in Scotland
(and then to vote for or against the Bill as a whole) on Tuesday. The Bill does not explicitly provide
protection for those who disagree with the proposed new definition of
marriage. A number of amendments
have been tabled which address these concerns.
·
Almost Half of Young People Made
Homeless by Parents
Homeless Link has published their annual Young
and Homeless report for 2013, based on a survey of homelessness
organisations and local authorities and interviews with young homeless people
and staff at homelessness providers. Key findings include:
·
The main cause of homelessness amongst young people is that their
parents are no longer willing to house them (44%), with the main driver being
the irretrievable breakdown of that relationship. Nearly half of young homeless
people become homeless for this reason
·
Almost half of young homeless people are NEET at the point of
becoming homeless and many lack independent living skills, sometimes due to
disrupted education or difficult childhood experiences
·
Around a quarter of local authorities and two-thirds homelessness
agencies reported that young people’s needs were more complex than last year
·
6 in 10 agencies said they were unable to provide support in the
last month due to limited capacity
·
A range of welfare reforms are having a negative impact on young
homeless people in particular, including the Shared Accommodation Rate limiting
access to suitable private housing, as well as benefit sanctions
·
Local authorities prevented homelessness for around a fifth of
young people approaching them for help, with homelessness more commonly
prevented amongst younger people aged under 18
The
report continues: “Family breakdown was the main driver of this cause of
homelessness. 53 of 67 homelessness providers and 50 of 70 local authorities
ranked this as one of the two main reasons for why families were unwilling to
accommodate the young person. The breakdown in relationship with a step-parent
was also a major driver.”
·
Early Intervention for Severe
Behavioural Problems
The Centre for Mental Health has published Building
a Better Future, an economic analysis of the long-term consequences of
severe behavioural problems that start in childhood and the benefits of
effective early intervention. Key points include:
·
About 5% of children aged 5-10 have conduct disorder with a
further 15 – 20% displaying behavioural problems
·
Conduct disorder is twice as high among boys as girls and rates of
conduct disorder are higher among children from disadvantaged backgrounds
·
Children with severe behavioural problems are 8 times more likely
to be on the child protection register, 6 times more likely to die before 30 and
20% more likely to end up in prison
·
If well implemented, parenting programmes can be very effective in
improving child behaviour, particularly by encouraging positive parenting
·
Other benefits of parenting programmes include positive impacts
upon sibling behaviour and the mental health and wellbeing of parents
·
In broad terms the effectiveness of parenting programmes is much
the same across a wide range of family types and ethnic group
Studies suggest that the average cost of bringing a child with
conduct disorder below a clinical threshold as a result of a parenting programme
is around £1,750 per case while the lifetime costs of conduct disorder have been
put at around £175,000 per case
Research
and Public Opinion
·
New government report shows couple
counselling and marriage preparation services deliver over £11 benefit for every
£1 spent
An
independent new evaluation of relationship support services has demonstrated
clear financial and emotional benefits to individuals and society as a whole reports Relate (See also
the
Telegraph). Specifically, the Department
for Education-commissioned report found that Relate’s couple counselling and
Marriage Care’s marriage preparation services deliver £11.40 and £11.50 of
benefit respectively for every £1 spent. This is calculated by looking at what
costs are saved by reducing the likelihood of relationship
breakdown.
The DfE commissioned the independent evaluation as part of the Prime
Minister’s commitment to relationship support. Relationship breakdown is
estimated to cost the UK economy £46 billion each year, with often devastating
and long-lasting emotional effects for individuals and families. The report
looked at services offered at different stages of a couple’s relationship:
marriage preparation, short relationship education classes and couple
counselling. All services were found to be associated with positive impacts,
with marriage preparation and couple counselling in particular leading to
positive changes in wellbeing and relationship quality.
The Relationships Alliance, a group of leading charities which aims
to put strong and stable relationships at the heart of a thriving society,
welcomes the report. Ruth Sutherland, Chief Executive of Relate (which is part
of the Alliance), said: “We are delighted that this report demonstrates the
financial and social benefits of services provided by Alliance members,
providing further evidence of the case for investment in this area. Every day,
we see first-hand the devastating impact that relationship breakdown can have –
so we know that our work to help couples understand each other and have the
tools to improve their relationships if they want to is absolutely
crucial.
The report also found that people who used relationship support
services were more likely to access support in the future. However the authors
identified the need for improved signposting to these services so that more
people can benefit throughout the course of their relationships. They also call
for a clear strategy for relationship support which encourages central and local
government and local public health departments to take account of the importance
of adult couple relationships and their impact on health and
wellbeing.
Mark Molden, Chief Executive of Marriage Care, added: “We welcome the
report’s findings and recommendations. We know that relationship support works
and we would encourage people of all ages to find out more about how the
services evaluated in this report could help them at different stages of their
relationships. We must also continue to help other professionals and service
providers understand more about what we do, so that they can direct people to
our services in their day to day work. It’s not just about getting support when
there’s a crisis; it’s about building and maintaining strong relationships which
see people through everything that happens during our increasingly busy and
fast-paced lives."
Further supporting these findings are the results of a DfE-funded
Randomised Control Trial of OnePlusOne’s training programme for frontline
practitioners working with families. The training was found to have a large and
positive impact on the way that practitioners handled conversations with parents
about their relationship difficulties, with practitioners who received the
training more than twice as likely to be confident in knowing both where and how
to refer parents on for further support.
·
When therapy works, the results
are lasting
Some people respond well to cognitive behavioural therapy. Some
don’t. A recent study found that kids with anxiety who responded well to CBT
were still doing better up to two decades later than kids who didn’t respond
well to treatment in childhood reports
Prevention Action.
Research at Temple University in Pennsylvania found that children
whose anxiety was successfully treated by cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) in
childhood were less likely to develop alcohol dependence, drug addiction and
panic disorders in later life. By contrast, those who were treated but who did
not respond successfully to CBT were more likely to experience substance misuse
problems and anxiety disorders.
However, compared to the general population, children who had anxiety
disorders were more likely to experience nicotine dependence and generalized
anxiety disorders as adults – regardless of whether they responded well to CBT
or not. “Childhood anxiety disorders may serve as a gateway disorder for later
substance misuse,” the researchers concluded.
Anxiety is common in both adults and youths. Roughly 10-20% of
children in US report “distressing levels of anxiety.” Anxiety disorders can
have important long-term implications, including depression, suicidal thinking,
and substance misuse.
CBT is considered an effective treatment for childhood anxiety
disorders. CBT is a talking therapy that aims to change how participants think
about a situation, in order to change how they act. Typically, 5 to 20 weekly
sessions lasting between 30 and 60 minutes each take place. CBT helps
participants make sense of overwhelming problems by breaking them down into
smaller parts.
Several clinical trials have demonstrated the effectiveness of CBT
for anxious children. But long-term studies of the role that early anxiety
treatment might play as children grow up have been scarce. Although follow-up
research has been carried out (from one to seven years after treatment), longer
follow-ups are uncommon. How does treatment of anxiety in children relate to
their adult outcomes?
The Temple University researchers tracked down adults who had
received CBT treatment for anxiety as children, and assessed their mental health
7 to 19 years after treatment. The participants were aged 7-14 at the time of
treatment and 18-32 in the latest follow-up. Self-report measures and diagnostic
interviews were used to assess their anxiety, depression, and substance use.
Substance use and misuse included alcohol, drugs, and nicotine. Of 150
individuals who were eligible for this follow-up study, 66 (44%) were located
and agreed to participate.
For many of these young adults who were treated for anxiety as
children, poor mental health persisted into adulthood. A large minority of the
study participants – 44% - had an anxiety disorder as adults. Just over a
quarter also met the criteria for depressive disorder, and 42% had a substance
use disorder.
Compared with a control group from the general population, both
successful and unsuccessfully treated groups had higher rates of nicotine
dependence and generalized anxiety disorders.
Researchers also compared successfully and unsuccessfully treated
patients. They found that those individuals who did not respond successfully to
CBT for an anxiety disorder in childhood had higher rates of panic disorder,
alcohol dependence and drug abuse in adulthood. Those individuals who responded
well to CBT during childhood were less likely to develop these
disorders.
Overall, the results of this study say little about whether CBT is an
effective long-term treatment for anxiety. However, they do suggest that in
those cases where CBT works for children, the benefits can be lasting.
·
What prevents many men seeking
help
Longstanding perceptions of what constitutes masculinity are
prompting many men to avoid seeking help when they require it, an expert has
said reports
BPS. According to Martin Seager, an advisor to the Samaritans and a former
head of psychological services at two NHS trusts, males are traditionally
unwilling to get assistance if they are feeling depressed or suicidal. This, he
said, is because many are "in the grasp of these very old rules about
masculinity", the Independent reports. "Too many men would rather die than feel
shame," he commented.
Mr Seager, who is a member of the Society, said this has been
apparent throughout his 30-year career, as women accounted for most of the
people he saw seeking help from NHS psychological services.
By contrast, he believes it is far more evenly split down the middle
at the Samaritans. Mr Seager believes this is because people can get support
from the charity without disclosing their identity. "There's a clear shame
thing," Mr Seager observed.
·
Building a Lasting Relationship:
The Three Pillars of Commitment
When it comes to understanding the fate of any given relationship,
I’d argue that knowing something about a couple’s commitment level, or their
attachment to each other and long-term perspective on the relationship, is
critical says
Science of Relationships. Beyond predictions about staying together versus
breaking up, commitment is also associated with all sorts of positive
relationship outcomes (see our previous article on 5 Reasons Commitment is Good
For Your Relationship). But how is commitment built in a relationship? More than
30 years of research on this topic has identified three pillars that form the
foundation of commitment in relationships.
Pillar 1: Satisfaction: This one isn’t particularly surprising —
individuals who are happy in their relationships and feel positively about their
partners (i.e., those with high satisfaction) are more likely to be in the
relationship for the long haul. Satisfaction stems from the benefits and costs
of being in a relationship. A satisfying relationship has a lot of benefits,
like intimacy, emotional support, sexual fulfilment, security, and
companionship. But even the best relationships have some costs. For example, you
may have less time to hang out with your friends if you are spending time
getting the aforementioned benefits from your partner. These benefits and costs
together form a global sense of “outcomes” associated with a relationship. Are
the outcomes in your relationship positive? Are the benefits greater than the
costs?
The second piece contributing to your satisfaction are the outcomes
you expect to receive in your relationship. Do you have really high expectations
for your relationship? If so, your outcomes need to be similarly high for you to
be satisfied. However, if your expectations are low, it doesn’t take much to
make you happy. For example, imagine that Mitchell and Claire are each getting
one backrub a month from their respective romantic partners. Claire has pretty
low expectations; she only expects to get a backrub once a year, so her current
relationship is wildly exceeding her expectations, and therefore she should be
really satisfied with her outcomes. Mitchell, on the other hand, expects to get
a backrub from his partner once a week, so if he only gets one each month he’ll
be very disappointed with his outcomes (and relationship). Of course,
exclusively basing one’s relationship expectations on the frequency of backrubs
is overly simplistic, but substitute whatever outcomes you value in your
relationship and it works just the same.
The bottom line is that relationships that meet and exceed your
expectations will be satisfying, but not getting what you want and believe you
should get from your partner is a recipe for dissatisfaction.
Pillar 2: (Low) Alternatives: Satisfaction is all about what you get
from a current partner. But what about alternative partners, or those people who
you could be with if you weren’t with your current partner? Perhaps there is
someone who could give you better outcomes than your current partner (e.g., more
frequent or better backrubs). If you suspect that you could do better elsewhere,
then your commitment to your partner is probably low. Why would you stay in your
current relationship if you could be with someone who could better meet your
needs for intimacy, emotional support, sexual fulfilment, security, and
companionship? (To fully answer this question, see Pillar #3 below.)
Usually when we think about alternatives, it’s that particular
someone who you could imagine being with if you weren’t with your current
partner — that hot guy in class, the waitress at the coffee shop who always
laughs at your jokes, or your neighbour who always likes to stop and chat when
you run into each other while walking your dogs. But alternatives don’t
necessarily have to be specific “other” possible romantic partners. Maybe you
could get better outcomes from spending more time with your friends or focusing
on your schoolwork rather than being in your current romantic relationship.
Having no relationship at all is a great alternative to being in an unsatisfying
or unhealthy relationship.
Pillar 3: Investments: Some days are better than others in your
relationship, and attractive alternatives may come and go from your life. As a
result, satisfaction and alternatives both fluctuate. But when satisfaction is
low (e.g., you just had an argument with your partner) and alternatives are high
(e.g., you just found out that your ex wants you back), why do people stay in
their relationships rather than breaking up? It comes down to the investments in
your relationship.
Investments represent the things you’d lose if your relationship were
to end — they are the stabilizing factors that keep things afloat during the
tough patches that couples go through. They may be tangible items, like the
house you and your spouse purchased together, or intangible things, like the
work and effort you put into your relationship over the years. Investments can
be from the past, like all of the memories you have with your partner, or may
relate to the future, like the vacation you planned together for next summer.
Social networks, like friendships with others, are another sort of investment —
if you were to break up with your partner, who would “get to keep” the friends
you and your partner have in common? In short, investments are the things that
you value in your relationships that would be lost if you broke up, and they
make it harder for people to easily leave their relationships.
Numerous studies show that these three pillars (satisfaction,
alternatives, and investments) pull the majority of the weight when it comes to
relationship commitment. This isn’t to say that other things don’t contribute to
commitment, but across the board, these three pillars are essential for
understanding how commitment is built.
·
Rom coms could save your
marriage
Forget the flowers, compliments and give-and-take, the key to a
lasting relationship is snuggling down in front of soppy movies says
the Telegraph (and the Daily
Mail). It is the problem that
has puzzled couples since the dawn of time, but according to new research it
could be an Indecent Proposal that saves your marriage. Forget the flowers,
compliments and the give-and-take - or even spending time apart - the key to a
lasting relationship is snuggling down in front of soppy movies.
Academics in America analysed 174 couples in the “move-and-talk”
study and concluded discussing on-screen relationships in five romantic comedies
over a month could slash the early divorce rate.
Participants attended a 10-minute lecture on the importance of
relationship awareness and how watching couples in movies could help spouses pay
attention to their own behaviour. They then watched Two for the Road, a 1967
romantic comedy about the joys and strains of young love, and met to discuss the
characters, before being sent home with around 50 romantic
titles.
Ronald Rogge, associate professor of psychology at the University of
Rochester in New York and lead author of the study, said: "The results suggest
that husbands and wives have a pretty good sense of what they might be doing
right and wrong in their relationships.
“Thus, you might not need to teach them a whole lot of skills to cut
the divorce rate. You might just need to get them to think about how they are
currently behaving.”
The research was published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical
Psychology.
·
Married
couples
Married couples are happier than those who live together, a major
State-funded study said yesterday reports Maybeido. It
found that even though husbands and wives have greater doubts than unmarried
couples about the quality of their relationships, they are more content than
cohabitees. When asked if they are happy with their lives overall, married
couples rate themselves much happier than other couples do.
The Enduring Love? study, produced by the Open University, said
mothers were the happiest people of all. And in general, couples without
children were happier than those who were parents. However, married people were
happier than unmarried couples, whether or not they had children.
The study, based on surveys of almost 5,000 couples, found marriage
was associated with happiness despite the willingness of married couples to
admit to flaws in their relationship. Married couples were more willing than
others to admit worrying more about the chores or money than whether they shared
the same values.
They were less likely to say they liked to make time for each other,
and more likely to say they were drifting apart than that they were entranced
with each other’s sense of humour. But nevertheless they said they were happier.
The report said: ‘Both married and unmarried people without children are happier
with their partner than parents.’ However, it found: ‘Married parents are as
happy with life overall as couples without children and both groups score higher
on this measure than their unmarried counterparts.’
The findings echoed results revealed by the Government’s own attempt
to measure national happiness and well-being, in which surveys conducted by the
Office for National Statistics found that married people are more satisfied with
their lives than others.
Married people are, according to overwhelming evidence gathered over
many years, generally better off than the unmarried. They enjoy better health
and their children do better at school. But the new wave of academic well-being
surveys that try to ‘drill down into embodied lived experience’, as the OU
report puts it, are now signalling that marriage is likely to bring greater
happiness with it.
The Open University report, which was funded by the Government’s
Economic and Social Research Council, said both married parents and childless
married couples put their overall happiness at around 4.1 out of five. Unmarried
couples, whether parents or childless, scored just over 3.9.
·
Who says romance is dead?
Workaholic couples resort to putting sex in the diary
Busy British couples have given up on ‘date nights’ with three out of
five now simply making appointments for sex to save their floundering marriages,
Netmums finds reports
the Telegraph. If spontaneity is the secret of keeping the flame of romance
alive the future is looking decidedly bleak for Britain’s working
parents.
According to research by the parenting website Netmums, British
couples’ lives have become so dominated by work that they are now resorting to
booking appointments with each other to ensure that they make time for intimacy.
It might not be the most romantic approach to marital harmony, but the fashion
for so-called “scheduled sex” has become so common that the website has ranked
it near the top of a list of new parenting trends of 2014.
In an informal poll of users on the site, three out of five of those
who responded admitted planning ahead for sex with their partner, with many even
putting it into their diaries. A third of them said they scheduled it as a
weekly fixture but a quarter admitted they managed once a month or less. It
amounts to a reinvention of the fashion for “date nights” but without any hint
of romance.
Siobhan Freegard, co-founder of Netmums, said: "Spontaneity is lovely
when you have time for it but people are realising that actually if you wait for
the spontaneous moment it will probably never come. “The general consensus is
that it is worth making the effort even if even if you don’t feel like
it.”
She said that during the recession couples with young children
increasingly gave up on going out together opting for evenings in. “Because they
know it is coming maybe they send each other little texts during the day – it is
often a bit more than just a functional 10 minutes in the utility room.”
·
What’s the most important factor
blocking social mobility? Single parents, suggests a new
study.
Next week, in his State of the Union address, President Obama is
expected to return to a theme he and many progressives have been hitting hard in
recent months: namely, that the American Dream is in trouble and that growing
economic inequality is largely to blame says
the Slate. In a speech to the Centre for American Progress last month, Obama
said: “The combined trends of increased inequality and decreasing mobility pose
a fundamental threat to the American Dream.” Likewise, New York Times columnist
Paul Krugman recently wrote that the nation “claims to reward the best and
brightest regardless of family background” but in practice shuts out “children
of the middle and working classes.”
Progressives like Obama and Krugman are clearly right to argue that
the American Dream is in trouble. Today, poor children have a limited shot at
moving up the economic ladder into the middle or upper class. One study found
that the nation leaves 70 percent of poor children below the middle class as
adults. Equally telling, poor children growing up in countries like Canada and
Denmark have a greater chance of moving up the economic ladder than do poor
children from the United States. As Obama noted, these trends call into question
the “American story” that our nation is exceptionally successful in delivering
equal opportunity to its citizens.
But the more difficult question is: Why? What are the factors
preventing poor children from getting ahead? An important new Harvard study that
looks at the best community data on mobility in America—released this past
weekend—suggests a cause progressives may find discomforting, especially if they
are interested in reviving the American Dream for the 21st
century.
The study, “Where is the Land of Opportunity?: The Geography of
Intergenerational Mobility in the United States,” authored by Harvard economist
Raj Chetty and colleagues from Harvard and Berkeley, explores the community
characteristics most likely to predict mobility for lower-income children. The
study specifically focuses on two outcomes: absolute mobility for lower-income
children—that is, how far up the income ladder they move as adults; and relative
mobility—that is, how far apart children who grew up rich and poor in the same
community end up on the economic ladder as adults. When it comes to these
measures of upward mobility in America, the new Harvard study asks: Which
“factors are the strongest predictors of upward mobility in multiple variable
regressions”?
1) Family structure. Of all the factors most predictive of
economic mobility in America, one factor clearly stands out in their study:
family structure. By their reckoning, when it comes to mobility, “the strongest
and most robust predictor is the fraction of children with single parents.” They
find that children raised in communities with high percentages of single mothers
are significantly less likely to experience absolute and relative mobility.
Moreover, “[c]hildren of married parents also have higher rates of upward
mobility if they live in communities with fewer single parents.” In other words,
as the figure below indicates, it looks like a married village is more likely to
raise the economic prospects of a poor child.
What makes this finding particularly significant is that this is the
first major study showing that rates of single parenthood at the community level
are linked to children’s economic opportunities over the course of their lives.
A lot of research—including new research from the Brookings Institution—has
shown us that kids are more likely to climb the income ladder when they are
raised by two, married parents. But this is the first study to show that
lower-income kids from both single- and married-parent families are more likely
to succeed if they hail from a community with lots of two-parent
families.
2) Racial and economic segregation. According to this new
study, economic and racial segregation are also important characteristics of
communities that do not foster economic mobility. Children growing up in
communities that are racially segregated, or cluster lots of poor kids together,
do not have a great shot at the American Dream. In fact, in their study, racial
segregation is one of only two key factors—the other is family structure—that is
consistently associated with both absolute and relative mobility in America. The
figure below illustrates the bivariate association between racial segregation
and economic mobility.
3) School quality. Another powerful predictor of absolute
mobility for lower-income children is the quality of schools in their
communities. Chetty, et al. measure this in the study by looking at high-school
dropout rates. Their takeaway: Poor kids are more likely to make it in America
when they have access to schools that do a good job of educating
them.
4) Social capital. In a finding that is bound to warm the
heart of their colleague, Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam, Chetty and
his team find that communities with more social capital enjoy significantly
higher levels of absolute mobility for poor children. That is, communities
across America that have high levels of religiosity, civic engagement, and voter
involvement are more likely to lift the fortunes of their poorest
members.
5) Income inequality. Finally, consistent with the diagnosis
of Messrs. Obama and Krugman, Chetty and his team note that income inequality
within communities is correlated with lower levels of mobility. However, its
predictive power—measured in their study by a Gini coefficient—is comparatively
weak: According to their results, in statistical models with all of the five
factors they designated as most important, economic inequality was not a
statistically significant predictor of absolute or relative
mobility.
Chetty, who recently won the John Bates Clark Medal for his
achievements as an economist under the age of 40, has been careful to stress
that this research cannot prove causation—that removing or adding these factors
will cause mobility in America. The study also acknowledges that many of these
key factors are correlated with one another, such as income inequality and the
share of single mothers in a community. This means that economic inequality may
degrade the two-parent family or that increases in single parenthood may
increase economic inequality. But what does seem clear from this study of the
“land[s] of opportunity” in America is that communities characterized by a
thriving middle class, racial and economic integration, better schools, a
vibrant civil society, and, especially, strong two-parent families are more
likely to foster the kind of equality of opportunity that has recently drawn the
attention of Democrats and Republicans alike.
Throughout his presidency,
Barack Obama has stressed his commitment to data-driven decision-making, not
ideology. Similarly, progressives like Krugman have stressed their scientific
bona fides, as against the “anti-science” right. If progressives like the
president and the Nobel laureate are serious about reviving the fortunes of the
American Dream in the 21st century in light of the data, this new study suggests
they will need to take pages from both left and right playbooks on matters
ranging from zoning to education reform. More fundamentally, these new data
indicate that any effort to revive opportunity in America must run through two
arenas where government has only limited power—civil society and the American
family. This is a tall order, to be sure, but unless President Obama, and
progressives more generally, can enlist a range of political, civic, business,
and cultural leaders—not to mention parents—in this undertaking, this new study
suggests they will not succeed in achieving one of their most cherished goals:
reviving America as a “land of opportunity.”
·
New academic study links rising
income inequality to ‘assortative mating’
Here’s another reason the rich are getting richer and the poor are
falling farther behind: A new
working paper by an international team of economists finds that better educated
people are increasingly more likely to marry other better-educated people while
those with less formal schooling are more likely to choose a less well-educated
partner reports
Pew Research. As a consequence, income inequality has increased because
education is strongly correlated with income—the more schooling you have, the
more money you typically earn, according to a team of economists headed by
Jeremy Greenwood of the University of Pennsylvania.
Economists call the tendency of people with similar characteristics
to marry “assortative mating.” For their study, Greenwood and his team tracked
patterns in marriages grouped by education level from 1960 through 2005 using
U.S. Census data.
Their analysis identified three distinct trends. Consistent with previous research, they
found that “the degree of associative mating [by education level] had increased”
over that time period, according to the working paper
published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. (For a detailed look at
marriage patterns of couples, see
this Pew Research report.)
But the big surprises came in household income trends among couples
with relatively more and relatively less education. Virtually across the board,
the income gap between couples with relatively high and those with relatively
low levels of education had widened substantially since 1960 relative to the
average household income.
For example, in 1960, a husband and wife, each with a high school
education, would earn about 103% of the average household income. But in 2005, that same couple would earn
only about 83% of the average. At the other end of the education spectrum, a
couple in which both partners had done post-graduate work earned about 176% of
the mean household income in 1960 but a whopping 219% in 2005.
Expressed another way, the relative earnings of couples with high
school degrees had fallen by 20 percentage points relative to the average while
the household incomes of highly educated husbands and wives had increased by 43
points.
To assess the overall impact of these trends on income inequality,
they conducted a novel test. They first computed the overall level of income
inequality in 1960 and 2005. Then
they estimated what income inequality would have been if couples were randomly
matched by education level. In effect, they asked what income inequality would
have been if education didn’t matter in selecting a spouse, and if men and women
with lots of schooling were as likely to marry people with relatively little
education as they were to choose better educated partners. The difference in those two numbers
would mark the impact of associative mating by education on income
inequality.
The statistic they used to gauge income inequality was the Gini
coefficient, which measures income inequality on a scale from zero to 1. Zero represents no inequality—as if
everyone earns exactly the same amount—and 1 represents perfect inequality,
which would occur if one person earns everything and everybody else makes
nothing.
Greenwood and his colleagues estimated that the Gini coefficient was
.34 in 1960, or about a third of the way to complete inequality. When they
randomly matched people by education level and recalculated the coefficient, the
answer was basically the same: The
Gini coefficient still stood at .34, suggesting that assortative mating by
education played little, if any, role in income inequality.
Then they applied the same method to 2005 data. Now the overall Gini
coefficient was .43, an increase of about .09 since 1960 and consistent with
other research. But when they randomly matched people by education and re-ran
their analysis, the Gini index plummeted to .34, showing that today,
“assortative mating is important for income inequality.”
One reason for these changes is because more married women than ever
are joining the labour force (and marrying similarly educated men), which
reinforces the income gains for better educated couples. Their evidence: When they randomly
matched men and women by education level, income inequality in 2005 declined.
(Other studies have also shown that the increase in married women’s labour force
participation has not been the same across education groups. College-educated married women have
increased their work hours, so it has become even more valuable for
college-educated guys to have college-educated wives, at least in monetary
terms.)
The study is the latest entry in a contested area of research to
examine inequality and income of married couples. On the one hand, economist Gary Burtless
of the Brookings Institution has found that between 10 percent and 16 percent of
income inequality in the United States “was caused by the growing correlation of
earned incomes received by husbands and wives.”
Researchers Deborah Reed
and Maria Cancian reported in 2001
that the increasing correlation of husbands and wives’ earnings in the late
1960s through the mid-1990s worked to worsen inequality. They also found,
contrary to some researchers, that changes in men’s earnings was the largest
source of rising income inequality while changes in women’s earning actually
reduced the disparity.
Partner
News
·
Nearly 90% of couples find
marriage preparation useful, so why do 75% of them dread going?
Marriage
Care is encouraging engaged couples to rethink their attitude to marriage
preparation following the release today of new research, commissioned by the
Department for Education, that highlights its benefits. The Government’s ‘Evaluation
of Relationship Support Interventions’ report assesses the effectiveness of
marriage preparation, relationship education and couple counselling services
provided by a number of charities including Relate, Marriage Care, and The
Tavistock Centre for Couple Relationships.
It revealed that 88% of couples who attended Marriage Care’s marriage
preparation courses found them useful, despite the fact that only 25% had wanted
to attend from the outset. Significantly, of the 243 Marriage Care clients
interviewed post-course, all said that they believed every engaged couple would
benefit from signing up for some marriage preparation. “Marriage preparation is
like cod liver oil,” says Mark Molden, Chief Executive of Marriage Care.
“Although the relationship benefits are clear, at the moment it tends to be
something that people do because they feel they ought to rather than because
they want to.”
David and Kelly are youth-workers who signed up for marriage
preparation at a Marriage Care centre in Nottingham. “Initially we weren’t very
enamoured about attending,” says Kelly. “Afterwards my friend asked how it went,
expecting me to say it was rubbish, but I said ‘no, it was brilliant’. It gave
us tools to talk to each other properly, and at the end I was reduced to tears.
I’ve recommended it to my friends so many times over.”
Adds Bridie Collins, Marriage Care’s Director of Relationship
Education and Support, “Couples who choose to get married in the Catholic Church
are required to have a certificate of attendance at marriage preparation. This
can be just one more thing on the ‘to do’ list – until the couple arrives at our
course and discovers that it actually does make their relationship stronger.”
The Department for Education findings confirm this, stating that although
couples already felt good about their relationship, those attending Marriage
Care’s marriage preparation courses saw a significant positive change in their
relationship quality or well-being, often in the space of only one day.
“As a society, we spend more time learning to drive than we do on
preparing to share the rest of our life with someone we love,” says Mark. “We
expect that successful long-term relationships will just ‘happen’ without the
need for any guidance or learning, but unfortunately the divorce statistics and
increasing number of separated families demonstrate that this thinking is
flawed. We need to open up the UK debate, and question why we don’t take our
relationships seriously enough to invest in them during the early stages.”
Marriage Care is the largest single provider of marriage preparation
services in England and Wales, with 52 centres and nearly 800 trained
volunteers. The national charity supports couples through the best and worst of
times, offering two different marriage preparation services (FOCCUS© and
Preparing Together) as well as relationship counselling. “Marriage preparation
highlights important areas of life that can make or break a marriage, and it
gives couples space to discuss their thoughts and feelings,” Mark explains.
“Whether couples choose the FOCCUS© questionnaire and facilitated feedback
sessions or our Preparing Together day course, the communication process and
increased understanding that they share as a result can make a real difference
to how successfully they navigate the tough times that all long-term
relationships face over the years.”
Duncan, a fitness coach, agrees. He went to one of Marriage Care’s
courses in Newcastle with fiancée Alexandra: “It highlighted stuff that you
might have talked about but not given any weight to. Everyone thinks that their
problems are their own. Others think you are alright from the outside, but
inside you could be quite anxious. That’s why I thought this course was so good,
because it gave us an arena where you could talk about the things that you might
be thinking about, and that’s important. It felt safe to do that.” The research
uncovered that attending marriage preparation significantly changed
participants’ attitudes towards attending couple counselling in the future.
“This is a really positive development,” says Bridie. “We offer
support at all stages of a marriage or relationship, and not just during a
crisis situation, so if attending marriage preparation helps give confidence to
couples to come much sooner for support when their relationship hits tough times
then that’s good news.”
The Department for Education study also showed that Marriage Care
reaches more economically disadvantaged couples as a result of its commitment to
offer its services to all regardless of ability to pay. “Couples need to be able
to access relationship help and support regardless of their financial
situation,” says Mark. “More broadly, with £11.50 of benefits delivered for
every £1 spent on our marriage preparation services, it makes financial sense
for our society to support long-term relationships at the outset, rather than
waiting until they get into trouble.
New
Books, Resources and materials
·
You don’t have to stop arguing,
just ‘do it better’ relationship experts say
Arguing doesn’t have to mean that children suffer if couples take
action to ‘argue better’, research suggests says
One Plus One. Conflict and feuds are a normal part of being in a
relationship and research shows that family relationship patterns can be passed
on from one generation to the next, so it’s important to be aware of ways to
ensure they are less harmful.
The book, Parental
Conflict: Outcomes and Interventions for Children and Families examines the
differences between ‘destructive’ and ‘constructive’ conflict and how both kinds
affect children, why some children are more adversely affected than others. It
features the latest evidence on how conflicts impacts on child physiology and
interventions to help couples in conflict.
It shows that conflict can affect family life by influencing the way
couples parent, as well as how children understand and make sense of this
conflict. Destructive conflict such as sulking, walking away, slamming doors or
making children the focus of an argument can have a detrimental impact on their
development.
Children exposed to such conflict between parents are at a greater
risk of a range of negative outcomes including social, emotional and behavioural
difficulties. However, children
react better when parents can relate to each other more positively during
arguments, and when conflicts are resolved.
Co-author, Dr Catherine Houlston, from OnePlusOne said: ‘We know that
conflict is a normal and necessary part of family life. ‘It’s not whether you
argue but how you argue which matters most to kids. Evidence suggests that
working with couples at an early stage in their relationship or during times of
change we can modify destructive patterns of conflict behaviour. Practitioners
and those working regularly with parents are in a key position to identify
families in need’
Co-author Professor Gordon Harold, Andrew and Virginia Rudd Professor
of Psychology at the University of Sussex said: ‘Today’s children are tomorrow’s
parents. ‘The psychological fallout from homes marked by high levels of
inter-parental conflict can lead to negative behaviour and long-term mental
health problems that repeat across generations. Effective intervention can help
to break this cycle, improving outcomes in the short and long
term.’
Forthcoming
conferences and events
·
Forthcoming
conferences
Details of all forthcoming conferences can always be found under our listing at
2-in-2-1
·
Marriage Week aims to break world
record for wedding vow renewal!
Thousands of couples across the UK will reaffirm their wedding vows
simultaneously on Saturday 8th February 2014 at 5:15pm for The Big Promise world
record attempt as part of Marriage Week 2014.
The couples taking part in The BIG Promise event, launched in the
Houses of Parliament during Marriage Week 2013, hope to break the current world
record of 1089 couples renewing their vows which was set in the US in 2009.
Dave Percival, The BIG Promise project coordinator, said: “The
thought of thousands of couples from Newquay to Orkney saying together ‘We
will!’ is just fantastic. The occasion will be both serious and huge fun – a bit
like marriage really!”
“Marriage Week has always stood for encouraging and thanking couples
for all that marriage means for them and for society. This year we really want
people to celebrate just how important the promises we make are. They offer the
foundation for a stable and loving family; what we build on that foundation is
up to us, but we want people all over the country to join with us and send out
the message: ‘these promises matter’!”
One couple taking part will celebrate fifty years of marriage
together on the day of The Big Promise! Tom and Doreen Shaw from Sheffield will
join with their friends, community and family to reaffirm their vows on their
golden wedding anniversary at the Rock Christian Centre in Sheffield.
Looking
forward to the world record attempt, Doreen Shaw said: “We started out with
nothing but our marriage wasn’t built on what we had, rather on who we were.
Marriage has made us better people I hope. We are so excited to celebrate 50
years together on the same day as The Big Promise.”
Consultations
and Campaigns
Below is our running list of current and recent consultations and
campaigns. New items or those requiring action are highlighted. The Reference
numbers are to the newsletter where we covered the subject.
·
The future of civil partnership in
England and Wales
The Government has published
a consultation paper on the future of civil partnership in England and
Wales. This is the full public consultation required by section 15 the Marriage
(Same Sex Couples) Act 2013. The Government will consider responses to the
consultation alongside evidence about marriage of same sex couples, civil
partnership and possible options for the future.
The closing date for responses is 17 April 2014.
Soap
Box!!
·
Building a well designed
marriage
Last night we did the first half of our marriage prep course with six
couples. As ever the couples came in a typically sceptical frame of mind – and
by the end I think most left with a definite intent to return in a fortnight’s
time – initial barriers had been broken down, and we had got them thinking about
life “Beyond the Honeymoon”. Last night we sent them off with their “homework”
for next time – thinking about the kind of marriage and family they want to
build – even to think about their epitaph as a couple.
It was good to know that doing this has now been assessed by the
government funded study as meaningful, and having a benefit both to the country
and to the couples. Our own experience and the feedback of the couples whom we
have had through the course over the past 27 years had certainly given us that
belief, but now it’s been independently assessed. Probably for us the greatest
testament to the course is that one of our co-leaders is a couple who did their
marriage prep with us 23 years ago – it made enough impression for them to want
to come and be part of it with us after all these years!
Having the Government report can only be a good thing – it’s the sort
of evidence that should have a good shelf life (the old One Plus One report
(from the 90’s?) that found that Marriage Prep did no good is still quoted to me
from time to time). It has the benefit of having been done here in UK (people
seem to discount overseas studies) by creditable agencies on well established
courses and interventions.
But, as the Marriage Care press release points out, having a
creditable programme or product is only part of the battle. Our own course is
mandatory for couples getting married in our church (a bit like the Catholics
and Marriage Care courses) and we get >95% uptake. In earlier times when it
was well plugged but voluntary, the uptake was only around 35%.
Whilst incentivising such courses (or even making them compulsory)
would increase attendance, the real issue is a change of understanding needed in
society that relationships are not just the product of luckily meeting the right
person with an added sprinkle of “magic love dust”, but are the product of our
values, beliefs, actions and environment – all of which are things we can choose
to influence and alter.
We are constantly fed the line that we can shape our own destiny by
working hard, doing things well etc and in so doing build a successful career,
lifestyle etc – yet we continue to believe somehow that luck is the biggest
influence on our love-lives.
That’s why our couples will spend the next two weeks (we hope!)
thinking about what kind of marriage they want to build – hopefully it will help
them develop a shared vision, one they can use as a reference point in life
ahead. It also gives them a context when we meet next time in which to
assimilate some of the skills and techniques we’ll share.
Hopefully they will end up want to build a “well designed marriage”
based on tools and approaches that are now validated not only by experience, but
by solid research that this stuff makes a difference.
Best
wishes,
The 2-in-2-1 Team
Technical
Stuff
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