Abstract
Despite a growing interest in the family trajectories of unmarried women, there has been limited research on union transitions among cohabiting parents. Using data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth, we examined how family complexity (including relationship and fertility histories), as well as characteristics of the union and birth, were associated with transitions to marriage or to separation among 1,105 women who had a birth in a cohabiting relationship. Cohabiting parents had complex relationship and fertility histories, which were tied to union transitions. Having a previous nonmarital birth was associated with a lower relative risk of marriage and a greater risk of separation. In contrast, a prior marriage or marital birth was linked to union stability (getting married or remaining cohabiting). Characteristics of the union and birth were also important. Important racial/ethnic differences emerged in the analyses. Black parents had the most complex family histories and the lowest relative risk of transitioning to marriage. Stable cohabitations were more common among Hispanic mothers, and measures of family complexity were particularly important to their relative risk of marriage. White mothers who began cohabiting after conception were the most likely to marry, suggesting that “shot-gun cohabitations” serve as a stepping-stone to marriage.
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Notes
A small percentage of respondents in our sample (less than 5%) were missing on this and the other two partner measures, as well as on measures of birth intentions and some family background measures (nativity, parent’s education, and parent’s marital status at the respondent’s birth). In the multivariate analyses, we substituted missing data on these measures with the sample mode or mean.
The respondent-level sample characteristics are almost identical to characteristics at the risk-spell level because there are 1105 respondents and only 1205 risk spells.
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We gratefully acknowledge research support from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development through grant R01 HD044761-04 and the Department of Health and Human Services, through grant 1 PO1 HD04561-01A1.
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Manlove, J., Wildsmith, E., Ikramullah, E. et al. Union Transitions Following the Birth of a Child to Cohabiting Parents. Popul Res Policy Rev 31, 361–386 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11113-012-9231-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11113-012-9231-z