Volume 23 - Article 31 | Pages 879–904  

Premarital cohabitation and divorce: Support for the "Trial Marriage" Theory?

By Hill Kulu, Paul Boyle

Abstract

A number of studies show that premarital cohabitation is associated with an increased risk of subsequent marital dissolution. Some argue that this is a consequence of selection effects and that once these are controlled for premarital cohabitation has no effect on dissolution. We examine the effect of premarital cohabitation on subsequent marital dissolution by using rich retrospective life-history data from Austria. We model union formation and dissolution jointly to control for unobserved selectivity of cohabiters and non-cohabiters. Our results show that those who cohabit prior to marriage have a higher risk of marital dissolution. However, once observed and unobserved characteristics are controlled for, the risks of marital dissolution for those who cohabit prior to marriage are significantly lower than for those who marry directly. The finding that premarital cohabitation decreases the risk of marital separation provides support for the "trial marriage" theory.

Author's Affiliation

• Hill Kulu - University of St Andrews, United Kingdom EMAIL
• Paul Boyle - University of St Andrews, United Kingdom EMAIL

Other articles by the same author/authors in Demographic Research

High Suburban Fertility: Evidence from Four Northern European Countries
Volume 21 - Article 31

Educational trends in cohort fertility by birth order: A comparison of England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland
Volume 51 - Article 36

Union formation and fertility amongst immigrants from Pakistan and their descendants in the United Kingdom: A multichannel sequence analysis
Volume 48 - Article 10

Family life transitions, residential relocations, and housing in the life course: Current research and opportunities for future work: Introduction to the Special Collection on “Separation, Divorce, and Residential Mobility in a Comparative Perspective”
Volume 43 - Article 2

Separation, divorce, and housing tenure: A cross-country comparison
Volume 41 - Article 39

Homeownership after separation: A longitudinal analysis of Finnish register data
Volume 41 - Article 29

Union dissolution and housing trajectories in Britain
Volume 41 - Article 7

A decade of life-course research on fertility of immigrants and their descendants in Europe
Volume 40 - Article 46

Co-ethnic marriage versus intermarriage among immigrants and their descendants: A comparison across seven European countries using event-history analysis
Volume 39 - Article 17

Social policies, separation, and second birth spacing in Western Europe
Volume 37 - Article 37

Why does fertility remain high among certain UK-born ethnic minority women?
Volume 35 - Article 49

Introduction to research on immigrant and ethnic minority families in Europe
Volume 35 - Article 2

Union formation and dissolution among immigrants and their descendants in the United Kingdom
Volume 33 - Article 10

Migration and union dissolution in a changing socio-economic context: The case of Russia
Volume 17 - Article 27

Fertility differences by housing type: The effect of housing conditions or of selective moves?
Volume 17 - Article 26

Family change and migration in the life course: An introduction
Volume 17 - Article 19

Most recent similar articles in Demographic Research

Left behind single in the partnering market? Entry into cohabiting unions by women and men with low educational attainment across regions of Europe, cohorts 1960 to 1985
Volume 51 - Article 43    | Keywords: cohabitation, education, Europe, European Social Survey, event history analysis, logistic regression, marginalization, partner selection, singlehood, union formation

Religion and union dissolution: Effects of couple and municipal religiosity on divorce and separation
Volume 49 - Article 20    | Keywords: couples, cross-level effects, religion, union dissolution

A register-based account of period trends in union prevalence, entries, and exits by educational level for men and women in Finland
Volume 48 - Article 14    | Keywords: cohabitation, divorce, education, Finland, marriage, register data, trends, union dissolution

Unemployment and fertility: The relationship between individual and aggregated unemployment and fertility during 1994–2014 in Norway
Volume 46 - Article 35    | Keywords: aggregated unemployment, event history analysis, fertility, individual unemployment, Norway, register data

Coping with ageing: An historical longitudinal study of internal return migrations later in life in the Netherlands
Volume 46 - Article 27    | Keywords: aging, event history analysis, life course, migrations, sequence analysis, trajectories