Marriage Foundation

For more than 15 years, one interpretation has come to dominate discussion of marriage among family researchers and policymakers. Yes, married parents are much more likely to stay together. But, as this argument goes, that's not because marriage makes any difference; it's because the kinds of people who marry were already more likely to stay together. @harrybenson6's completed PhD thesis suggests this consensus may rest on shakier foundations than many realize. Rather than challenging previous research outright, I decided to reproduce it. But when I made two methodological improvements, the results changed substantially. Instead of selection explaining almost all the difference in family stability, it explained only about half. Selection clearly matters. But marriage itself appears to have been substantially underestimated.

Family researchers have spent decades asking whether marriage simply reflects pre-existing commitment. They have devoted much less attention to the possibility that marriage itself might strengthen commitment, says @harrybenson6 Yet psychology offers several plausible mechanisms: ➡️ Scott Stanley's commitment theory distinguishes between "deciding" and "sliding," suggesting that relationships built on explicit decisions generate stronger dedication than relationships that simply drift forward. ➡️ Signal theory proposes that marriage functions as a uniquely costly and public signal of commitment, shaping expectations among partners, families, and communities. ➡️ Cognitive consistency theory suggests that once people publicly commit themselves to a lifelong relationship, they become motivated to behave consistently with that commitment. At the minimum, these theories suggest that the act of marriage has the psychological potential to transform some relationships for the better.

Read more: ifstudies.org/blog/does-marr…

When all eligible families are included and parents who eventually marry are compared with those who never do, marriage appears to matter considerably more than many influential studies have suggested. For years, researchers have asked whether married couples were already different before they married. That remains an important question. But @harrybenson6 has shown that prior selection provides an insufficient explanation. It is time to change the narrative and ask what happens to people when they marry.