Living Together Before Marriage

Cohabitation is the norm in society today. When a couple decides to live together, it usually happens when a decision of I will spend one night and then pretty soon all of the clothes are at the

Should we consider moving in before getting married? In the New York Times Magazine, the article The Downside of Cohabiting before Marriage states that “In 1960, about 450,000 unmarried couples lived together. Now the number is more than 7.5 million. The majority of young adults in their 20s will live with a romantic partner at least once, and more than half of all marriages will be preceded by cohabitation”. (1) Considering moving in with your partner before marriage you will get to know each other a lot better. The Census Bureau reports that over 40-50 percent of married couples in the United States end in divorce. When couples live with their partner prior to marriage, the responsibility is now of two instead of one. Splitting things like bills and rents has never been so easier. Moving is a huge step in a relationships. Two people are essentially committing loyalty to one another as they move in together. Living together is a better option prior to getting married.

According to Dalton Conley, cohabitation is the “living together in an intimate relationship without formal, legal, or religious sanctioning”(Conley 458). From this, one can assume that cohabitation happens primarily between two people that are in a relationship. When looking at cohabitation within the United States, it has become more evident that it is slowly increasing in popularity. During the early ages, cohabitation was considered very scandalous and was frowned upon, but as the years progress, more and more couples start living together. Whether it is to experience the lifestyle they would have living together as if they were married or living together in order to save money, more and more people are living with their significant other.

If you take a look at past generation couples, you will see that they will meet, fall in love, got marry than begun to start a family together. But obviously times are changing, nowadays, it is more common for couples to spend some time together (living together) before making that big decision and walking down the aisle. One of the biggest steps in a relationship is deciding to move in together but it also can be a good idea only if you and your spouse had an open and honest conversation about getting married prior to moving. For instances, men will probably say yes to building a future with you if he feels like his back is against the wall and he has no other choice, but then later down the

Marriage used to be essential to a couple sharing a life together. Now, it is becoming increasingly common for couples to live together before marrying. Sharing a single rent check, shyness about making a life-long commitment, or just the popularity of cohabiting celebrity couples, such as Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis, are all reasons moving in together before marriage is clearly more popular than ever. While generally viewed as the perfect opportunity for couples to ensure they are a good match before becoming “marriage-official,” cohabiting may actually increase relationship instability, negatively affects health, and even has negative impacts on children.

The problems that arise from this, is the lack of individual moments, which give key insights and perspective on how the relationship is going. When people cohabitate, they are living with each other’s faults, without any form of commitment set in place to allow for the forgivingness of a formal relationship to take place. The element of empathy is simply not present, causing more couples to be more and more argumentative,

People who move in together are less likely to stay married. The article “sociological reasons not to live together” says that “a more comprehensive national survey of family and households, based on interviews with 13000 people concluded about 40% of cohabiting unions (couples) break up without getting married”.

Couples start getting to know each other in a more closer and personal level when they live with each other which eventually gets them ready for marriage. Living together is a big thing, marriage is a bigger thing. It can help couples in many ways, to know if their spouse will help around the house to do chores. If the other person isn't putting in the same effort, it's kinda of hard for one person to get around everywhere and do everything, for instance, some men say that the women's job to do the housework such as clean, cook, take care of the kids, and the men just sit around and do nothing. Not all women like that.

a) Many people saying that living together before marriage is like when you are taking a car for a test-drive to help the person decide if they want that kind of car. They figure that while during their trial period it will give

Therefore, living together will ensure the couple whether or not they can get along in the future. Those people consider pre-cohabitation as an effective way to prepare themselves for being a family. According to Popenoe David, “in case the relationship goes sour, they can avoid the trouble, expense and emotional trauma” (4). It is a good idea to live together because if the couples have troubles they can just move out and continue with their separate lives without being obliged to undergo the different procedures of divorce. In the end, perhaps after living with various people, a person will finally find their appropriate partner for marriage and be happy. Popenoe points out that, “living together helps you see past romanticized notions and clue in to what marriage will really be like”(8). Accordingly, choosing reality as a primary factor to determine the result of cohabitation is a wise decision. People who cohabitate get a clue to see whether or not they will be able to share their lives with the partners they have chosen and what kind of disagreements might proceed within the relationship. Overall, the best opportunity of living up to one-another’s assumptions is to apprehend what they really are in advance and know what they care about.

Although marriage has been a central factor and gives meaning to human lives, the change in people’s lifestyles and behaviors through a long period of social development has resulted in alternate choices such as being single or nonmarital living. As a result, cohabitation has become more popular as a trendy life choice for young people. The majority of couples choose cohabitation as a precursor to marriage to gain a better understanding of each other. However, there are exceptions, such as where Thornton, Azinn, and Xie have noted: “In fact, the couple may simply slide or drift from single into the sharing of living quarters with little explicit discussion or decision-making. This sliding into cohabitation without

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).

One of important aspect of living together is that one can understand about their partner's likes and dislikes. It is important to know your partner with whom you are going to live forever and within few days, it is difficult to understand someone. Therefore, people like to live before marriages. It will help them to know each other and what their partner expects from them. They will learn about each other's interest. I think that people who live together before marriage have a better and strong foundation for their married life. Another advantage is that they can share their responsibilities and their work. For example, cleaning house, washing clothes. sometimes husband wants their wife to behave in certain ways and Wife want to share their work and she thinks earning money is a part of husband’s responsibility.so in this way they came to know about each other's mentality towards each other. Another advantage of living together before marriage is that the people who are afraid of marriage they have an advantage of living/experiencing a married life

together in the early 1980's were between 25 and 34 years old, and an additional

For today’s young adults, the first generation to come of age during the divorce revolution, living together seems like a good way to achieve some of the benefits of marriage and avoid the risk of divorce. Couples who live together can share expenses and learn more about each other. They can find out if their partner has what it takes to be married. If things don’t work out, breaking up is easy to do. Cohabiting couples do not have to seek