Family life has been radically transformed over the past three decades. Half of all households are unmarried, while only a quarter of all married households have kids. A third of the nation’s births are to unwed mothers, and a third of America’s married men earn less than their wives. With half of all women cohabitating before they turn thirty and gay and lesbian couples settling down with increasing visibility, there couldn’t be a better time for a book that tracks new conceptions of marriage and family as they are being formed.
The editors of this volume explore the motivation to marry and the role of matrimony in a diverse group of men and women. They compare empirical data from several emerging family types (single, co-parent, gay and lesbian, among others) to studies of traditional nuclear families, and they consider the effect of public policy and recent economic developments on the practice of marriage and the stabilizationor destabilizationof family. Approaching this topic from a variety of perspectives, including historical, cross-cultural, gendered, demographic, socio-biological, and social-psychological viewpoints, the editors highlight the complexity of the modern American family and the growing indeterminacy of its boundaries. Refusing to adhere to any one position, the editors provide an unbiased account of contemporary marriage and family.
Table of Content
List of Illustrations
List of Table
Acknowledgments
Introduction, by Elizabeth Peters and Claire M. Kamp Dush
Part I Perspectives on Marriage
1. Historical and Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Marriage, by Arland Thornton
2. Marriage and Family: The Evolutionary Ecological Context, by Bobbi S. Low
3. Gender Lens on Marriage, by Paula England
4. Institutional, Companionate, and Individualistic Marriage: A Social Psychological Perspective on Marital Change, by Paul R. Amato
Part II. Contemporary Families
5. Single Parenthood and Child Well-Being: Trends, Theories, and Evidence, by Rachel Dunifon
6. Cohabitation and Parenthood: Lessons from Focus Groups and In-Depth Interviews, by Wendy D. Manning, Pamela J. Smock, and Cava Bergstrom-Lynch
7. Examination of Child Well-Being in Stable Single-Parent and Married Families, by Claire M. Kamp Dush
8. Reconsidering the Association Between Stepfather Families and Adolescent Well-Being, by Megan M. Sweeney, Hongbo Wang, Tami M. Videon
9. Parenting by Gay Men and Lesbians: Beyond the Current Research, by Gary J. Gates and Adam P. Romero
Part III. Strengthening Marriage
10. Supporting Healthy Marriage: Designing a Marriage Education Demonstration and Evaluation for Low-Income Married Couples, by Virginia Knox and David Fein
11. Differentiating Among Types of Domestic Violence: Implications for Healthy Marriages, by Michael P. Johnson
Part IV. Future of Marriage
12. Growing Importance of Marriage in America, by Steven L. Nock
13. Future of Marriage and the State: A Proposal, by Tamara Metz
14. Why Won’t African Americans Get (and Stay) Married? Why Should They?, by Shirley A. Hill
15. Race, Immigration, and the Future of Marriage, by Daniel T. Lichter and Warren A. Brown
List of Contributors
Index
About the author
H. Elizabeth Peters is professor of policy analysis and management and director of the population program at Cornell University. Her research focuses on family economics and family policy, examining the effects of public policies such as divorce laws, taxes, and welfare reform on family formation and dissolution decisions, inter- and intra-household transfers, and investments in children. Her research has been widely published in journals of economics, demography, and sociology.Claire M. Kamp Dush is an assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Science and is a faculty affiliate of the Initiative in Population Research at The Ohio State University. Her current work centers on romantic relationship quality and stability and their impacts on and interactions with human development.
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