Little Known Research About Marital Happiness

If you’re interested in a great book that reveals the benefits of being marriage, then check out The Case for Marriage by Linda Waite and Maggie Gallagher.  

Much of the author’s research reveals a ton of positive data about marriage; as opposed to all the negative data we usually hear. Here’s one example, and it serves to provide real hope for unhappy couples:

How many unhappy couples turn their marriages around? The truth is shocking: 86 percent of unhappily married people who stick it out find that, five years later, their marriages are happier, according to an analysis of the National Survey of Families and Households done by Linda Waite for this book. Most say they’ve become very happy indeed. In fact, nearly three-fifths of those who said their marriage was unhappy…and who stayed married, rated this same marriage as either “very happy” or “quite happy” when reinterviewed…[roughly five years later].
The very worst marriages showed the most dramatic turnarounds: 77 percent of the stably married people who rated their marriage as very unhappy (on a scale of one to seven) … said that the same marriage was either “very happy” or “quite happy” five years later. Permanent marital unhappiness is surprisingly rare among the couples who stick it out.

(The Case for Marriage, pgs. 148-149)

Don’t miss that last sentence…

Permanent marital unhappiness is surprisingly rare among the couples who stick it out.

This is a game changer, and it begs several questions:

How does this research shape the way we view marriage and divorce?

How does it shape the “advice” we give to someone in a struggling marriage?

Most importantly, how does it shape the way we view our own marriage, especially when times are tough?

Let’s just chew on that for a while…