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Pathways to Adulthood and Marriage: Teenagers’ Attitudes, Expectations, and Relationship Patterns
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Marriage patterns in the United States have changed substantially in recent decades. People are marrying later in life than they did 40 years ago and young adults today are spending more time unmarried than earlier generations did (Schoen and Standish 2001; Fields 2004). Over this same period, cohabitation and nonmarital childbearing have become increasingly common (Bumpass and Lu 2000; Chandra et al. 2005; Martin et al. 2007). These shifts in marriage patterns have sparked considerable interest among researchers and policymakers, as well as some concern about their potential social impact-in particular, their possible adverse effects on the well-being of children (McLanahan and Sandefur 1994; Amato 2001).
In this report, we examine some of the potential precursors of these changes in adult marriage patterns. In particular, we examine the experiences and attitudes of teenagers, in order to gain a better understanding of factors that may influence their views of marriage and their relationship choices in adulthood. We focus on teenagers’ initial exposure to and experiences with romantic relationships and marriage, as well as their general attitudes toward marriage. We also examine marriage and relationship patterns among a recent cohort of young adults and identify factors in adolescence associated with the likelihood of choosing various relationship pathways in early adulthood. Previous research has examined the factors that put teens at risk for early involvement in sexual activity (Kirby 2007). However, there is less evidence concerning teens’ attitudes toward marriage and their more general experience with romantic relationships and dating (Crouter and Booth 2006; Florsheim 2003; Karney et al. 2007; Giordano 2003).
The information provided in this report is useful for several reasons. First, trends in teenage attitudes toward marriage can provide an indication of whether current trends in adult marriage patterns are likely to continue. In addition, information on teen romantic relationships is an important indicator of adolescent health and well-being, as national surveys of teens consistently show that issues surrounding romantic relationships and sexual activity are among adolescents’ biggest concerns (Kaiser Family Foundation 2003). Finally, the growing interest in marriage and relationship skills programs that serve adolescents has created a need for improved research evidence concerning teens’ romantic relationships and attitudes toward marriage (Karney et al. 2007). This information can help program developers design relationship and marriage education programs that are age-appropriate and in tune with the experiences of today’s youth. It can also help policymakers and program operators better assess the needs of teens in their communities and choose program models that are most appropriate for the teens they serve.
This report adds to the research evidence on teens’ romantic relationships and attitudes toward marriage. Drawing on data from four large national surveys, the report provides new research evidence on teens’ experience with romantic relationships, their attitudes and expectations concerning romantic relationships and marriage, and their relationship outcomes during the transition to young adulthood. The specific questions addressed in the report fall into three broad categories:
The report is intended for a broad audience, including the developers and operators of teen relationship skills programs, policymakers, and academic researchers. Most of our analysis is descriptive, with results presented in illustrative tables and figures that highlight the main patterns and trends. In addition to presenting new research findings, the report reviews and discusses evidence from other recent studies of adolescent relationships and attitudes.
In the remainder of this chapter, we briefly review prior research evidence concerning adolescent romantic relationships and describe the data sources and methods we use in our analyses. We end the chapter by outlining the remainder of the report.
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Previous studies of adolescent development have established that romantic relationships and dating are very common among teens. For example, data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79) Children and Young Adult Surveys indicate that more than half of all teens have had some dating experience by the time they are 16 years old and more than 40 percent of those who have ever dated said they were currently “going steady” with someone (Cooksey et al. 2002). Consistent with these statistics, data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health (Add Health) indicate that more than 80 percent of teens experience their first romantic relationship before they turn 18 (Carver et al. 2003). Although many of these relationships end soon after they begin, it is not uncommon for a teen’s closest or most important relationship to last a year or more (Carver et al. 2003).
Mounting evidence suggests that these early experiences with romantic relationships can have long-standing impacts on teens’ relationship behaviors that stretch into adulthood. For example, drawing on data from the Add Health survey, a recent study by Raley et al. (2007) found that the odds of getting married or cohabiting before age 25 are at least 50 percent greater for men and women who were involved in a romantic relationship in their junior or senior year of high school than for those who were not in a high-school relationship, controlling for family background and other personal characteristics. Teens’ relationship experiences have also been tied to a range of other outcomes, including mental health, delinquency, and marital expectations (Crissey 2005; Haynie et al. 2005; Joyner and Udry 2000).
Although most teens have romantic and dating relationships, studies suggest there are substantial differences in teens’ experiences, attitudes, and interests. Next, we summarize the research on differences in romantic relationships across various groups of youth, in particular those defined by gender, race/ethnicity, and income level.
Research on gender differences in teens’ romantic relationships, for example, suggests that boys and girls express similar levels of love and emotional engagement in their romantic relationships but that boys have more trouble navigating relationship issues, such as breaking a date or communicating how they want to be treated (Giordano et al. 2006). There are also gender differences in teens’ attitudes and expectations concerning marriage, with girls somewhat more likely than boys to say they expect to get and stay married (Thornton and Young-DeMarco 2001).
In terms of racial/ethnic differences, research shows that African American teens are less likely to date or participate in serious romantic relationships than teens from other racial/ethnic groups (Cooksey et al. 2002; Crissey 2005). African American teens are also less likely to say they expect to get married, even controlling for their more limited dating experience (Crissey 2005). Operators of adolescent relationship and marriage education programs have expressed concern that existing relationship skills programs are not always age-appropriate or culturally sensitive for diverse populations (Karney et al. 2007). Therefore, information on such racial/ethnic differences in teens’ experiences and attitudes is especially important for the development of new program models.
There is less evidence concerning possible socio-economic differences in teens’ relationships and attitudes. Many studies have documented the unique challenges low-income couples face in forming and sustaining healthy adult marriages, and have noted that rates of marital distress, divorce, and nonmarital childbearing are higher for low-income couples than for similar couples with higher income levels (Amato et al. 2003; Fein 2004; McLanahan 2004). However, few studies have examined whether such socio-economic differences are reflected in teens’ attitudes and experiences (Karney et al. 2007). This omission is important, given the recent emphasis on low-income couples in a growing number of relationship skills programs (Dion 2005).
Finally, there is also relatively little evidence on how teens’ attitudes and relationship experiences have changed in the last decade. Studies by Schulenberg et al. (1995) and Thornton and Young-DeMarco (2001) used nationwide data from the Monitoring the Future study to examine changes in teens’ attitudes toward marriage and family from the 1970s through the mid-1990s. Both studies found that although teens remain generally supportive of marriage, a growing number want to delay getting married until later in life and most now support the idea of couples living together before marriage. Studies have not examined whether additional changes have occurred since the mid-1990s. Information on changes in teens’ attitudes and expectations concerning marriage is important to ensure that adolescent relationship and marriage education programs take account of the common views of today’s teen population.
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The limited research evidence on adolescent romantic relationships is due in part to a lack of nationally representative data. No single national data set includes all of the information needed to assess teens’ early experiences with romantic relationships, their attitudes and expectations concerning romantic relationships and marriage, and their relationship outcomes in young adulthood. Therefore, for this report, we draw on data from four different sources: (1) the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97), (2) Monitoring the Future (MTF), (3) the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG), and (4) the Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS). We describe our use of these four data sets below.
National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997. With a large sample of young people, the NLSY97 is well suited for an analysis of high-school-aged youth. This survey, which began in 1997 and is conducted every year, follows respondents from their early teenage years into early adulthood. It was designed to be nationally representative of youth born from 1980 to 1984 (ages 12 to 16 in 1996). Further, the sample includes a large number of African American and Hispanic youth, which allows us to examine differences by race and ethnicity.
For this analysis, we focus on two waves of the NLSY97, one conducted when the respondents were in their teens and another that tracks them into their early 20s. The 1999 survey wave includes a sample of more than 6,600 teens between the ages of 15 and 18(1) and was conducted during the last year in which a large portion of the NLSY97 sample was still high school-aged. In Chapter II, we use the 1999 data to describe the youths’ families and their early relationship experiences. In Chapter IV, we use the 2005 wave of the NLSY97 to examine the relationship outcomes of this same cohort of young people when they were young adults between the ages of 20 and 25. In particular, we describe their patterns of dating, cohabitation, and marriage. All of the analyses are weighted to account for the survey sampling design and to reflect the national population in the appropriate year.
Monitoring the Future. Unfortunately, no data set currently tracks marriage attitudes and expectations for a nationally representative sample of teenagers. However, the MTF study tracks these items for a nationally representative sample of high school seniors. Since the mid-1970s, the MTF study has conducted an annual survey of 12th graders. Because the survey is conducted annually, the data can be used to track changes in the marriage attitudes and expectations of high school students over the past 30 years. Of course, trends in marriage attitudes among high school students may be different from trends among all teens. This potential difference should be kept in mind when interpreting results that are based on MTF data.(2)
The MTF study is best known for collecting and reporting information on youth substance use and risk behaviors (Bachman et al. 2002). However, the survey also includes a broad range of questions concerning attitudes toward marriage. For example, students are asked whether and when they expect to get married, whether they expect to stay married to the same person for life, whether they support the idea of couples living together before marriage, and whether they view marriage and family as important parts of their lives. We describe these measures in greater detail in Chapter III. The survey also collects data on demographic characteristics, information that can be used to examine how the attitudes and expectations of high school students differ by gender and racial and ethnic background.
Although the MTF study collects data for a large sample of more than 10,000 students per year, only a randomly selected subgroup of students are asked the survey questions concerning their attitudes toward marriage. Therefore, the analyses of MTF data presented in this report are based on smaller samples of about 2,500 students per year. When reporting results separately for different racial/ethnic groups, we pool data for two consecutive years to ensure that the sample sizes are large enough to generate precise estimates for each group. All of our analyses are weighted to account for the survey’s multistage sampling design.
National Survey of Family Growth. Additional information on teens’ attitudes toward marriage comes from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth, a nationally representative survey of the non-institutionalized U.S. population ages 15 to 44 conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS). For this report, we focus on data for the subsample of respondents ages 15 to 18, which includes 900 teenage boys and 909 teenage girls. Data from the NSFG can be used to examine how teens’ attitudes toward marriage differ by family background characteristics (such as income status and whether the teen lives with both biological parents), information that is not available in either the NLSY97 or the MTF. The NSFG also uses different measures of attitudes than the MTF, including measures of teens’ attitudes toward divorce and nonmarital childbearing. We describe these measures in greater detail in Chapter III. The NSFG oversamples African Americans and Hispanics, which allows us to conduct some of our analyses separately by racial and ethnic subgroups.(3) All of our analyses of the NSFG are weighted to account for the survey’s multistage sampling design. We also account for the sampling design when calculating statistical significance tests.
The Youth Risk Behavior Survey. The YRBS is a large, long-standing survey of high school students that was designed to monitor adolescent health risk behaviors, such as smoking, alcohol use, and sexual activity. The survey began in 1991 and is conducted every other year on a nationally representative sample of 10,000 to 16,000 9th through 12th grade students enrolled in public and private schools. For our purposes, the YRBS provides information on trends in sexual activity from 1991 to 2005, which we present in Chapter II.(4) As with the MTF study, the YRBS has the limitation of including only teens who are enrolled in high school. It, therefore, does not provide information on trends in sexual activity for all teens, including those who have dropped out of school.(5)
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Chapters II through IV of this report address the three research questions outlined above. Chapter V provides a summary of our main results and discusses possible directions for future research. Chapters II through IV are described in more detail below.
Chapter II examines the family environments in which teens are raised and their early experiences with romantic relationships. We examine the family structure in which teens are living and their perceptions of their parents’ relationship. We also describe teens’ early forays into romantic and intimate relationships, through dating and sexual activity. The data for this chapter come primarily from the NLSY97.
Chapter III examines teens’ attitudes and expectations concerning romantic relationships and marriage, drawing primarily on data from the MTF study and the NSFG. We examine teens’ general attitudes toward marriage and cohabitation, and whether these attitudes have changed over time. We also analyze teens’ personal expectations of marriage to explore how teens think marriage fits into their own future.
In Chapter IV, we take advantage of the longitudinal component of the NLSY97 to examine teens’ relationship outcomes in young adulthood. We follow the sample members into their early 20s, when many have begun to form serious romantic relationships. We analyze various relationship pathways, including marriage, cohabiting, and dating, and the quality of the relationships these young adults form.
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1. We excluded the small number of sample members younger than age 15 in 1999, so the sample is comparable to data from the National Survey of Family Growth, which does not survey people younger than 15.
2. Our analysis of data from the 2002 National Survey of Family Growth suggests that dropouts have somewhat less positive views of marriage than do teens who have remained in school. Therefore, the attitudes toward marriage of all teens (including dropouts) are somewhat less positive than the attitudes toward marriage of high school students (the population that can be tracked with MTF data). However, it is unclear how these differences in attitudes between dropouts and enrolled teens would affect trends in attitudes observed in MTF data.
3. Our NSFG analysis sample includes 356 African Americans and 369 Hispanics. Other subgroups used in our analysis of NSFG data are substantially larger than these subgroups, with the exception of our subgroups based on family income. The sample sizes for these subgroups are 843 for those with family income below 200 percent of poverty, 622 for those with family incomes from 200 percent to 400 percent of poverty, and 344 for those with family incomes more than 400 percent of poverty.
4. YRBS data from 2007 were not yet available at the time we conducted our analysis.
5. Teens who have dropped out of school are more likely to be sexually active than are teens who have remained in school. Therefore, the levels of sexual activity based on YRBS data reported in Chapter II would be somewhat higher if high school dropouts could be included. It is unclear, however, how the exclusion of dropouts affects the recent trends in teenage sexual activity observed in YRBS data.
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