Love in the Time of Studying
Here’s a question for those of you who are married: Where did you meet your spouse (general term for husband or wife)? In the U.S., there is a long tradition of using schools as places for making romantic connections. Historically (traditionally), school has been a popular place to meet your future husband or wife in the U.S., as is probably true in many countries. In 1992, 23% of married Americans said that they meet their spouse at school (such as high school) or at the university. Only 15% of people said they met their spouse at work.
Now, things have changed. In 2006, a similar survey found that only 14% of U.S. married couples first met at school, and 18% met at work. The work figure (number) has increased three percentage points, but the school/university number has gone down more dramatically. What is going on here (what is happening)?
While schools were always seen as a place where men and women had time to meet and develop romantic relationships, both men and women nowadays (currently, now) are getting married at a much later age than they did 20 years ago. The average age for a man in the U.S. to marry is 27.5 years; for a woman, it’s 25.5 years. There are many reasons for this change. An article today in the Wall Street Journal says that part of the reason is “credential inflation” at work. Credentials are qualifications, such as a university degree or training. Inflation is when something continues to increase over time. The article is saying that jobs nowadays more and more require people to get higher and better qualifications (Master’s degrees, for example) so that young people have to wait to marry so that they can finish this additional training. Perhaps this is one reason why Internet dating has become more popular. As people have fewer opportunities to meet eligible (unmarried) men and women, they need to find other ways of meeting people. College students now believe that they need to wait to marry, and so don’t start looking for a potential spouse until after they leave school, even though college is probably the one time in their life where they will have a lot of time and opportunity to meet an eligible mate (spouse).
What about me? Well, I married at the age of 33 and met my spouse…at school! So I guess I am an exception to the current trend in some ways.
~Jeff
January 31st, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Hi Jeff,
Other than the truly acceptable reason brought up by the Wall Street Journal another motive in regard to delayed marriage-time could also be explained. I believe that , in contrast to e.g. decades ago, when marriage was a general consensus to get couples togeter, nowadays youngs would, first, prefer to experience couple-life as boy friend-girl fiend (BF-GF) and then end up getting married. Certainly, you are aware of some marrieges that took place for some couples after living together for decades as boy/girl friend. To summarize, people’s mentalitiy about marrieage and BF-GF life has been dramatically altered!!
Regards
Sam
January 31st, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Hi Jeff
I am glad that you are lucky .It’s very nice when you listen everybody is lucky and happy in marriage. But sometimes there are a lot of problems for young people in another countries, for example
in my native country.
I was born in Iran and 18 years old as in Iran happened a big revolution . It happened very fast and unfortunately changed a lot of things in our culture .
Nowadays our people are not aloud to be together before the marriage .It is unbelievable but true that only for a normal dialog between boys and girls in university, our students must have a lot of problems…Then how can you expect they meet their spouse at school or university?!
In our country,most of the couples marry only after a short dialog by family or sometimes only dialog between parents (in villages).
They are living together many years without love and its really sad . Just they live together because they have children…about average age ,for women in Iran is 18-35 and for men is till ever
when you have enough money…unfortunately my English language is not enough good to explain all of the problems about young people in Iran but I hope freedom and happiness for the country like
30 years ago…
I believe that it’s important to marry with LOVE and only LOVE . It’s no matter at school , at the work or everywhere .
be happy and always in LOVE
Jamshid from Berlin
January 31st, 2008 at 1:17 pm
But I suppose you didn’t be a student at that age Jeff, probbably you were teaching at that school same as your wife?…..
We met mine in an academy training us to improve our degree at work, so we were working in the same work, and surprise the same building just in the centre of Madrid. The problem was that in that building there were more than two thousand clerks working in as it was the head office.
Just tomorrow, the first of february, shall be 40 years that we met each other by the first time, we took a sit after her bench and she turned her head and said to me…..you are new, don’t you? that was the begining of a long long way till now …….and we were so young. She was 21 and me 24, after a year we got married, and after four we had three daughters.
Now young get married with more than 30 usually, even much more because same problem you describe above Jeff. Life is more difficult than before, and our young have to live with their parents nearly till 32 years old or more, because they have not a good job, or have not enough money to buy a house, and so on.
January 31st, 2008 at 5:28 pm
I was married at 1972 in Japan. When I met my wife, I was a student of the university and my wife was one of subordinate of my father at a factory. I was introduced her by my father. This is very special case in Japan. Usually young people would not obey their parents. I was a very good boy, of course. May be, I was a little too good!
Any way, at those days I believed that marriage is one of easy way to survive during hard times after World War 2.
Now, I think the similar phenomena which Jeff describes are occurring in Japan. My opinion of its reason is physical (or economical) richness and mental poorness.
February 1st, 2008 at 6:26 am
Hi,
I just write this comment to explain the current conditions of Iran’s society in response to Jamshid’s comment. I do not know how the conditions were in 1979 when Jamishid was 18, but I am now 25 and the conditions are quite different. Nowadays, many students find their spouses at schools and there is no limitation for it at all. 3 of my best friends found their spouses in the university in which we were studying and all of them had the opportunity to know each other well before their marriage. However, I am not lucky enough to find my own at school, perhaps it will happen at work!
February 1st, 2008 at 1:51 pm
Hi Tina
I am very happy that a girl from my country read my text. I was for about 2 years ago in Iran after 18 years and it was very sad that at Tehran’s street was still control ,and you know last time was again
problem for our people that why they don’t have islamic dress .
Our people are not free we have a big prison with about 70 million prisoner .
I live in a free country and I can see the freedom for people . sometimes when I see in TV or Internet (you tube) somethings about Iran ,for a long time I am really sad .
Do you think you are free when you are not aloud visit your boyfriend .In Iran Love is taboo, in Iran kissing is taboo and all things that indicate Love is taboo.
sorry Tina maybe you are very young but love has a big meaning in my heart . I saw Shah time and I saw the freedom in Iran.
At that time we was free as all people in free country and now…
sorry no we are not free at all.
maybe I am in a free country and a little more spoiled but my heart is always by may compatriots .
Jamshid from Berlin
February 1st, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Hi Jamshid,
On this matter I tend to agree with Tina. I have been at university for 10 years (studying and teaching English). Students (in Iran) are now free to choose their prospective spouses with security. They meet, they get to know each other for some time, and they may get marrid. University officials even support such on-campus marriages (ezdevaje daneshjooyee). Things have changed in Iran in the past 10 years (both for the better and the worse). However, research indicates that traditional marriages are more lasting and conflcit-free compared to couples cohabiting before marriage and even being friends for a long time before marriage: Harway, Michele (2005) Handbook of Couples Therapy.John Wiley & Sons, Inc., (p. 31)
• Couples who cohabit before marriage reported poorer communication and greater marital conflict than married couples who had never cohabited
(Thomason & Colella, 1992).
• Premarital cohabitors have demonstrated significantly lower marital quality and significantly higher risk of marital dissolution (DeMaris & Rao, 1992).
• Premarital cohabitors in several countries, including the United States, Canada, Sweden, and New Zealand, have divorce rates that run 50% to 100% higher than noncohabitors (Axinn & Thornton, 1992).
• One finding, which would seem to have rather explicit implications for commitment, is that following a relationship breakup, cohabitors were much more likely to return to their parents’ home for an extended stay than those who had married, that is, 20% as opposed to 2% of the married. Goldscheider, Thornton, and Young-DeMarco concluded: “it is difficult to argue that cohabitors resemble married people” (1993, p. 695).
February 2nd, 2008 at 12:39 pm
Life is very complicated everywhere and each person has a world inside. What is good for one may be bad for other, and I do not belive that there is a universal formula for love and for a good marriage.
Sometimes it depends only of luck, and doesn’t matter if you have or not have previous sex touch or cohabitation. We all think that is better to know each other previously, but often relationship breakup very soon.
And as Vahab says other traditional marriages are more lasting and have great love after some years of marriage than free marriage with previous or not cohabitation.
Who knows?. I think that is very difficult to get right about this matter, and often what was love first it turns at hate later, or may be just the contrary…first feel nothing afterward
love for ever. ¿Why?…it depends of so many things that it is very difficult to guess when you decided to marry her or him. Love, sex, relationship are the eternal questions that move our lifes, because it should be very boring to live without every day conflicts about these matters.
Thak you Jeff for this so great theme to talk about, as time goes on I like more the blog because I may read so many and different opinions like Tina’s, Kuwabara’s, Jamshib’s, Sam’s and Vahab’s and so on.
Here in Spain we have an idiom: ” Who in marriage gets right in all gets right” (Quien en el casar acierta en todo acierta) and I think it is a big truth.