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Does the rising rate of chabitation mean that we are witnessing an end of
marriage? DOES THE RISING RATE OF COHABITATION MEAN THAT ...
Submitted by lryel on March 2, 2006
Category: Social Issues
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DOES THE RISING RATE OF COHABITATION MEAN THAT WE ARE WITNESSING AN END OF MARRIAGE?
SOCIAL CHANGE IN CONTEMPARY SOCIETY
SOCI102
In today's society cohabitation is an increasingly popular trend amongst couples. Trost’s 1975 study hypothesized that cohabitation would decrease marriage rates, with Sweden and Denmark providing empirical support for his hypothesis. We now see that this is indeed the case in both America and the United Kingdom. It is important to understand the preference towards sharing a household, without legal documentation, to review the future of marriage rates and whether society will witness a decline in marriage to a point where married couples are rare.
There is ambiguity in the meaning of cohabitation. Sociologists each have their own definition of cohabitation in relation to the partnership between the couple. For example, Arafat and Yorburg (1973) defined cohabitation as, ‘living together with a member of the opposite sex’, whereas Macklin (1972, 1974) put forward four typologies of cohabitation. ‘Type A’ standing for a couple who share the same bed for four nights each week over a period of three consecutive months, to a ‘Type D’ couple who spent less than four nights a week in the same household for less than three months. This indistinctness can sometimes make cohabitation figures unreliable and difficult from which to draw conclusions.
It is clear from published statistics and from social studies that the rate of cohabitation is increasing, although it has not yet overtaken marriage rates. Statistical data on cohabitation in the General Household Survey shows that the number of women cohabiting has risen from 11% of 18-49 year old women in 1979, to 26% in 1996. It is impossible to...
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