The Case for Marriage is written by Linda Waite, a family scholar at the University of Chicago, and Maggie Gallagher, director of the Marriage Program at the Institute for American Values. The book presents solid, scientific evidence of the multiple benefits of marriage for adults and children.
“An important role marriage plays,” Waite says, “is that it makes you the most important person in someone else's life. It gives you someone to trust, to listen, someone who really cares, and having a confidant is extremely important to help people deal with stress and for their emotional and physical well-being. People in tightly bonded relationships have better health.”
Waite and Gallagher explode five myths about marriage:
Myth 1. Divorce is usually the best answer for kids when a marriage becomes unhappy.” The authors discover that the vast majority of “bad marriages” that don’t end up in divorce eventually become good marriages. In a study of people who in “bad” marriages who chose to stay together, 86 percent reported five years later that their marriages had turned around and were now happier. In fact, 60 percent said their marriages had become "very happy."
Myth 2. Marriage is primarily for the benefit of children. In reality, marriage has significant benefits for children and adults. Marriage is an important social institution that delivers big benefits in virtually every indicator science can measure.
Myth 3. Marriage is good for men but bad for women. Waite said a balanced look at the research shows that married men and women both report less anxiety and depression, higher self-esteem, more financial stability, and a much higher level of general happiness. The research is compelling that people do better when they get married and stay married.
Myth 4. Promoting marriage puts women at risk for violence. In fact, the opposite is true: marriage seems to protect women from domestic violence and personal violence. Married people are less likely to be victims of interpersonal violence. In studies of domestic violence between partners, married people are substantially less likely than cohabiting people to say that arguments between them became violent (4 percent married, 13 percent cohabiting).
Myth 5. Marriage is a private affair of the heart between two adults. The authors say that marriage is a public legally binding, religiously supported promise that two people will stay together and act as a team for their entire lives.
“Marriage changes the way they see themselves, and it changes the way other people see them and treat them,” Waite says. “It also strengthens the bonds between children and their father’s side of the family.”
What are some of the benefits of marriage?
- Better physical health and substantially lower risk of early death and debilitating illness.
- Better emotional health (in fact, in a survey of 14,000 people, “marital status was one of the most important predictors of happiness,” with the married reporting the highest level of happiness, and separated and divorced reporting the lowest levels of happiness).
- Financial health and stability increases substantially.
- Married couples report that love and lifelong commitment seem to increase sexual fulfillment and dramatically reduce the risk that their partner will cheat.
“When society as a whole helps support marriage as an institution, we are all better off,” the authors say. “Cohabitation is something that individuals can create for themselves, by themselves. The decision to marry…is a choice to enter into a larger, more durable bond, which requires social, moral, and legal support. By recognizing the public union of men and women, the larger society helps individuals achieve the goals and gains marriage represents: a supportive partner one can trust, a safe place for raising children.”
“Today’s high rates of divorce and unwed childbearing also respond to the public policies our governments promote,” they write. “There are steps we can and should take to support marriage as a public promise, a moral ideal, and as a social institution.”
