Paul Amato and Sarah Patterson, Population Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University
In the 1930s, family scholars speculated that divorce "runs in families" (Burgess & Cottrell, 1939). Since then 25 studies on this topic have been published, and almost all have shown that divorce is correlated across generations. While researchers currently debate whether the intergenerational transmission of divorce (ITD) has become weaker in the United States in recent decades, experiencing marital instability as a child continues to be one of the most reliable predictors of adult divorce. What is less clear is why the ITD exists and whether it involves only divorce or all forms of union instability. This study contributes to these debates by expanding the scope of ITD to also include disrupted non-marital cohabitations. Using the Add Health (a national dataset of adolescents and young adults), this research investigates the impact of union instability between parents and children, as well as potential mediating variables that may explain the relationship.
Intergenerational Transmission of Union Instability
The first empirical evidence for the intergenerational transmission of divorce (ITD) was not presented until the 1950s (Landis, 1955), even though family scholars long speculated that divorce “runs in the family (e.g., Burgess & Cottrell, 1939). While recent works debate whether the ITD has weakened in the United States in recent decades (Wolfinger, 1999, 2011; Li & Wu, 2008), almost all studies on this topic have shown that divorce is correlated across generations (e.g., Amato, 1996, Amato & DeBoer, 2001).
We relied on data from Waves I and IV of Add Health to estimate the effects of parent union instability (through the child age of 16) on offspring union instability. We included instability due to divorce, death, and cohabitation disruption. When weighted, these data are nationally representative of adolescents in Grades 7 through 12 in the United States during the 1994–1995 school year (Harris et al., 2009). Because the oldest youth in Wave IV were in their early 30s, the data provide a picture of relationship instability in the early adult years—a time that is demographically dense with life-course transitions.
We found that less than half (43%) of offspring who grew up in stable families had experienced a union disruption. This number increased to 49%, 58%, and 63% among offspring who had experienced one, two, or three or more parent union disruptions, respectively.
Our final statistical models revealed that each additional parent union disruption appeared to increase the number of offspring union disruptions by 16%. Additional tests showed that parent religiosity and the number of siblings were negatively associated with instability, young women reported less instability than men, and non-Hispanic blacks reported more instability than non-Hispanic whites.
We then examined associations between parent union instability and 11 potential mediating variables. All the mediators appeared to be good candidates for explaining the link in instability across generations. Sobel tests (MacKinnon, 2008) revealed that delinquency, a record of suspension or expulsion, number of sexual partners, educational attainment, and age at first union all played significant mediating roles in the analysis (p< .05). Nevertheless, the amount of mediation that could be attributed to any single variable was small. Although the mediators collectively accounted for 44% of the estimated transmission effect, no single mediator accounted for more than 1%, net of the other mediators. This result occurred, of course, because the mediators were correlated. In other words, young adults who achieved relatively little education also tended to form unions and have children at early ages. They were also more involved in delinquent activities, more likely to be suspended or expelled, less close to their parents, less likely to get good grades, and more sexually active during adolescence. Because these outcomes tend to cluster together (theoretically and empirically), it is difficult to consider them in isolation.
Although a 16% increase might not seem like a large effect, instability in the child’s family was a risk factor for dropping out of the sample and may have attenuated the strength of the association. Moreover, the mean age of respondents in Wave IV was only 30 years. Many individuals in the study who had not yet experienced a union disruption eventually will, and many individuals who reported a disruption will experience additional ones in the future. As unstable unions accumulate across the life course, the magnitude of the intergenerational correlation is likely to increase. This should occur because restricting the amount of variation in a variable attenuates the magnitude of its correlation with other variables.
Despite the modest strength of the association, our study indicated that the intergenerational transmission of union instability (ITUI) begins relatively early in the life course—that is, within the first decade of adulthood. If we could extend our view earlier in time to include adolescent dating relationships, we might find that the ITUI appears even earlier. Of course, breaking up with dating partners is expected given that one purpose of dating is to rule out poor matches. Nevertheless, a history of close relationships—especially those with a sexual component—that break up during adolescence and early adulthood might be an indicator of difficulty forming stable intimate relationships in later life. Given that the number of parent union disruptions was positively associated with the number of offspring sexual partners in the current study, this hypothesis is likely.
Additional analyses found that discord in stable families of origin also appeared to increase the risk of union instability among offspring. Moreover, whereas youth from unstable families tended to form unstable unions, youth from stable families tended to form either stable unions or no unions at all in early adulthood. Presumably, many offspring who had not formed unions were biding their time until they had finished their educations, became established occupationally, or found the “right” partner. Postponing first union formation until the late 20s or 30s may be an adaptive strategy for some youth in an era of high union instability.
References
Amato, P. R. (1996). “Explaining the Intergenerational Transmission of Divorce.” Journal of Marriage and the Family 58: 628‑640.
Amato, P. R. and DeBoer, D. (2001). “The Transmission of Divorce across Generations: Relationship Skills or Commitment to Marriage?” Journal of Marriage and Family 63: 1038-1051.
Amato, P. R. and Patterson, S. E. (2016). “The Intergenerational Transmission of Union Instability in Early Adulthood.” Journal of Marriage and Family, published for early view Dec. 6, 2016, doi:10.1111/jomf.12384.
Burgess, E. W., and Cottrell, L. S. (1939). Predicting Success or Failure in Marriage. New York: Prentice-Hall.
Harris, K. M., Halpern, C. T., Whitsel, E., Hussey, J., Tabor, J., Entzel, P., and Udry, J. R. (2009). The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health: Research Design. http://www.cpc.unc.edu/projects/addhealth/design.
Landis, J. T. (1955). “The Pattern of Divorce in Three Generations.” Social Forces 34: 213-216.
Li, J. A., and Wu, L. L. (2008). “No Trend in the Intergenerational Transmission of Divorce.” Demography 45: 875-883.
Wolfinger, N. H. (2005). Understanding the Divorce Cycle. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Wolfinger, N. H. (2011). “More Evidence for Trends in the Intergenerational Transmission of Divorce: A Completed Cohort Approach Using Data from the General Social Survey.” Demography 48: 581-592.
Wu, H. (2015). “Marriage-to-Divorce Ratio in the U.S.” National Center for Family and Marriage Research. Retrieved from: https://www.bgsu.edu/ncfmr/resources/data/family-profiles/wu-marriage-d…
Copyright © Population Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
Suggested citation: Paul Amato and Sarah Patterson. (2017). “The Intergenerational Transmission of Union Instability in Early Adulthood” Spotlight: Research Brief, January, 2017
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