Cohabitation, Marriage, and Divorce

Data From the National Survey of Family Growth
Based on a 2002 study by the CDC based on face-to-face interviews with 10,847 women age 15-44 in 1995.
Summary of results by Richard Niolon

How many women marry, divorce, and cohabitate?

  • About 28% of all women have never married nor cohabitated. 31% have married with cohabitation, and 31% have married without cohabitation. 10% have married but never cohabitated. 75% of Black women are likely to marry at some point in their lives, compared to 91% of White women, though both rate it equally as important
  • At any given time, roughly 50% of women are married, 7% are cohabitating
  • Trends were for high chances of divorce from the 1950s to mid-1970s, leveling off from 1975-1984 for White women, but increasing from the 1960's to 1970's slowly, then increasing at a greater rate in the 1980's.
  • For all women, 39% of cohabitation relationships end in 3 years, and of those remaining, 58% turn to marriage. 49% of cohabitation relationships end in 5 years, and of those remaining, 70% turn to marriage. The percentage that turn to marriage within 5 years are 75% for White women, 61% for Hispanic women, and 48% for Black women
  • Increasing cohabitation is offset by the increases in divorce, so the number of coupled women is about the same

How likely is a cohabitating relationship to turn into a marriage?

  • Cohabitation is more likely to turn to marriage if the woman comes from a two-parent home, has never been raped (14% for White women, 5% for Black women), values religion (7% more likely), has never suffered from GAD, and comes from a higher family education and income. This is less so for White women (4% difference in cohabitation to marriage rates between low and high incomes families), but more so for Black women (32% difference in cohabitation to marriage rates between low and high incomes families)
  • White women were more likely to have cohabitation turn to marriage if they were employed. Black women were more likely to have cohabitation turn to marriage if they were employed full-time, but more likely to have the marriage break up if they were employed part-time
  • Community prosperity is related to relationship stability, with cohabitation being more likely to lead to marriage in prosperous areas (27% more likely for White women, 13% more likely for Black women), and both marriage and cohabitation being more likely to fail in poor neighborhoods.

    Using rates of male unemployment as the guide:

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