Does Marital Status Affect A Person 's Happiness?

People believe that marriage is easy and is the key to love and happiness, but in reality marriage is harder than it looks. Everyone marries for different reasons, for good or for bad. People today don’t understand the meaning of marriage; it is more than just money and appearance. Seeing today’s world of marriage is being influenced by media shows like Jerry Springer, Judge Judy, and Murray makes you realize how society today identifies marriage different. Couples who live unmarried will be happier and have more choices than those that are married in agreement with Catherine Newman’s essay called I Do. Not.: Why I Won’t Marry in the book “Acting Out Culture: Reading and Writing “, by: James S. Miller. Catherine Newman is a writer and an author

Modern, contemporary society’s mindset on marriage has shifted considerably over the years. Some research has noted the increase in early sexual experiences, greater acceptance of cohabitation and the increase in narcissistic tendencies, are complicating and muddying the ideals of what marriage means to people today. Research done on this subject resulted in several studies that found that spouses who did not believe that marriage would last forever, were less likely to commit to the relationship financially and were more likely to have extramarital affairs.

Reeves, Senior Fellow, Economic Studies Co-Director, Center on Children and Families they state that “There is a growing marriage gap along class lines in America. This may be bad news for social mobility, since children raised by married parents typically do better in life on almost every available economic and social measure.” (Howard and Reeves para. 1) This first portion of the article talks about how not a lot of people are getting married and people not getting married may be causing a whole dilemma within social and economic mobility which in result leads to more families living in poverty. In addition, Howard and Reeves written “In 1950, almost 90 percent of children age 0-14 lived with married parents-- now that proportion has fallen to less than two-thirds of children. The gap in marriage is growing, especially in terms of childbearing. While marriage is struggling against cultural, social and economic headwinds in poorer communities, it is flourishing among affluent, well-educated Americans who are both more likely to marry and more likely to stay married.” (Howard and Reeves para 3.). In paragraph 3 of “The Marriage Effect: Money or Parenting?” they write about how back in the 1950s 90 percent of children grew up in a parenting household but now two parenting house has decreased than two thirds of the

In this essay, “The Cohabitation Epidemic,” by Neil Clark Warren, is talking about why many people decide to live their lives in cohabitation instead of getting married right away. Older generations would look at cohabiting as being something bad or even immoral. In this century, this epidemic is something common and, notwithstanding, normal. Over the years, the U.S. Census Bureau has kept up with how this lifestyle has evolved. In 1970, they had 1 million people that were “unmarried-partner households,” and that number rose to 3.2 million in 1990. In the year 2000, they had 11 million people living in those situations.

　　First, the author states that those married couples who directly married without cohabitation have a lower divorce rate than those having cohabitation before marriage. Warren intends to prove that marriage provides stable relationship between a couple and cohabitation undermines such a relationship. The premises Warren used to support his claim are a result from one study and David and Barbara’s review. The problem here is based on the evidence Warren provided; it is difficult to conclude that marriage can hold people together and cohabitation may destroy such stable relationship between a couple. One reason is the sample size used in the study is too small compared to the millions of people who cohabit. Hasty generalization makes this premise questionably lead to the conclusion. The other premise which is the review from David and Barbara is also not trustable because no detailed evidence is provided to

“Will Your Marriage Last?”, by Aviva Patz, is a cohesive article about marriage and divorce. Aviva Patz is the executive editor of Psychology Today. Patz narrates the story of Ted Huston, a professor at the University of Texas, who followed the lives of 168 couples for 13 years after their wedding date. She was then able to draw conclusions about what makes a couple stay together or end up filing divorce papers. Although marriages and divorce are the themes of this article, it is really about society’s pressure on young people to be perfect.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the poverty rate for single parents in 2009 was 37.1%, while the rate for married couples with children was 6.8%. This means that being raised in a married family reduces a child’s probability of living in poverty by 82%. Policies that can be implemented to strengthen marriage would be ones that educate the public on the benefits of marriage to financial stability and child development. Returning to economic policies, the welfare system has penalties against marriage within it that create incentives to not get married. Since benefits are reduced as a family’s income rises, a single mother will receive more benefits than if she had an employed husband in the home. For low-income couples, this means that marriage would cause a decline in welfare benefits and an overall decline in the couple’s joint income. In order to remove these disincentives, the welfare system could be changed to increase the value of earned income tax credit for married couples with children. Work requirements can again be of assistance by making it so able-bodied parents are required to or look for work in order to receive aid. This will prevent the appeal of using welfare as an alternative to work or marriage. By implementing these ideas, marriage will increase and poverty and welfare dependence will

Relationship satisfaction is an important part of romantic relationships. A lack of satisfaction can lead to consequences in other areas of life and eventually, the destruction of the relationship. For example, job performance is heavily influenced by romantic relationship satisfaction. In a study by Greenhaus and Beutell (1985), they argued that poor satisfaction leads to poor job performance and vice versa. They stated this was to because these two spheres are “interdependent.” Satisfaction can also influence quality of health. Conflict in a marital relationship is associated with higher heart rates and blood pressure (Broadwell & Light, 1999; Ewart, Taylor, Kaemer & Agras, 1991; Flor, Breitenstein, Birbaumer & Furst 1995; Frankish & Linden, 1996; Kiecolt-Glaser, 1993; Mayne, O’Leary, McCrady, Contrada & Labouvie, 1997; Morell & Apple, 1990; Shwartz, Slater & Birchler, 1994; Thomsen & Gilbert, 1998). It is also strongly associated with depression and depressed syndromes (Beach, Fincham & Katz, 1998; Fincham & Beach, 1999). This relationship between marital conflict and depression seems to be bidirectional meaning depression is not only a result of conflict but also is caused by the conflict (Beach, et. al., 1998; Fincham & Beach, 1999). Because a lack of relationship satisfaction can negatively affect so many important areas of life, it is important to understand what influences the level of satisfaction held in romantic relationships.

They say, “...married people have better health than those who are not married”(Essig and Owens 236). However they lack the facts to back up their statements. They use divorce as an example as to why marriage can cause health issues. The authors state, “...married and never married Americans are similar; it’s the divorced who seem to suffer”(Essig and Owens 236). The issue is that they write as if all marriages will end in divorce.

Unsatisfied with their partners results in divorce rates and infidelity. These have increased over the years, blemishing the institution of marriage. People may believe that compromises and self sacrifice in a marriage make it a failed institute but the same reasons make a marriage successful. A married man has a constant in his life- his partner. The security and companionship in the relationship helps him achieve happiness. The same sharing is now a pleasure, a way to prevent loneliness (Argyle; 1999). Marriage is known to cause greater satisfaction, greater self esteem and less distress. Evidence shows that married men and women are happier.

There has been a myth for the past five years or so saying that the divorce rate in the United States has been around 50 percent. But, this statistic is completely false. What has been happening is the “divorce rates [have] increased [for couples married] in the 1970s and 1980s, but in the last 20 years they have dropped” (Miller 2014). This is great ‘news’ but the question is, why has it dropped so much when just a few years ago couples were divorcing like it was no big deal? A new study executed by Ronald Rogge, Ph.D., and Thomas Bradbury, Ph.D., shows that newly married couples can reduce their divorce rates by simply watching movies. There are a ton of romantic movies out there but, they never really show what happens after the main couple

Cohabitating families are more likely than married families to be poor, and poverty harms children in many ways. Cohabitating parents also tend to have less formal education a key indicator of both economic and social resources than married parents do. And cohabitating families don’t have the same legal protections that married parent families have. Most important, cohabitation is often a marker of family instability and family instability is strongly associated with poorer outcomes for children (Manning

Relationships are can be very important for a person’s happiness or may have in some ways thought to be important for happiness. One thing that is thought to make a person happy is marriage. Even though marriage has a great influence on a person’s life it doesn’t make them necessarily happy (Stein A37-A40). A person that is married is generally someone who was already happy but if a person is unsociable or lonely the person may become happier. Marriage can make a person less happy if they expect too much of the other person or think that the person is perfect. A person may become happier by having close relationships and acting kind and grateful but to remain happy the person needs to keep doing these actions and continuing these relationships to continue being happy (Wallis A2-A9). As a child a person must make many relationships to be successful resilient. If a person is abused as a child the person does not have good relationship and may not always grow up happy. If a child has someone to support or encourage the child they will be more likely to be happy this person is called a champion (Gorman A52-A55). A person that has a negative attitude can cause bad relationships and can also cause others to be unhappy. Because of this idea a person must choose a person that can be

These constraints lead some cohabiting couples to marry, even though they would not have married under other circumstances. On the basis of this framework, Stanley, Rhoades, et al. (2006) argued that couples who are engaged prior to cohabitation, compared with those who are not, should report fewer problems and greater relationship stability following marriage, given that they already have made a major commitment to their partners. Several studies have provided evidence consistent with this hypothesis (Brown, 2004; Rhoades, Stanley, & Markman, 2009).

Waite and Gallagher also discuss the benefits that marriage gives to couples. Including the financial benefits, in that through specialization and by sharing incomes getting married boosts standard of living by thirty percent and this benefit is not incurred by cohabitating, as those who cohabitate do not share as much and are less committed to the wellbeing of their partner. In addition to the financial benefits, they also discuss the emotional benefits of knowing you have someone who loves you and who would take care of you. Children similarly benefit from having married parents as there are more financial resources available to help take care of them and they get to spend more time with at least one parent.