Poll:Should couples live together before marriage?

[Jonahan]

I'm going to go a different route than everyone else here and say:

No.

Oops, that's what everyone else said too.

The only reasonable argument that I believe anyone can start from with an opposing viewpoint is that there's a greater chance of a successful marriage if you work out the "living together" issues and still decide you want to get married. Unfortunately, that's not the reality of the situation. I know many couples who did this and in the end said that getting married changed *everything* anyway.

And as for the boyfriend/girlfriends or fiance/finacees living together who AREN'T having sex...

Riiiiigght.

 

[eturner74]

no

 

[Rhylla]

i don't think it's a wise thing to do.

i've had all the arguments thrown at me before about how you can't get to know people if you don't live with them first, and u have to have a trial run or you'll risk finding you're incompatible in all sorts of areas!

but i knew my hubby without having to live with him. He was my best friend and i was with him ALL the time, cept we lived in different houses. I KNEW he was messy and didnt like housework without having to shack up with him lol
Because he was my friend i knew we'd talk things through if we came across problems. Also knew that there would be off days when we niggled each other, we could talk those out too.
So spend as much time as possible with your intended a definite yes, actually live together before marriage... throwing yourself headfirst into temptation there!

-Rhylla-

 

[Templedweller]

No No No

I agree its not wise and though someone very close to me did so b4 marrying...and my mother thought it'd cause me to do the same IT DID NOT and I DO NOT agree that it is a wise or prudent thing to do. Just my thoughts!!!

 

[JPPT1974]

Amen to that Templedweller!!

 

[Templedweller]

Thanks JPPT1974!!!

 

[nattie]

I think they should my mom did.

 

[lovemysoldier]

I would like to again thank all of the people that participated in this survey. I am posting the rough draft of my research presentation for those that are interested. It is a bit long but worth the read.


Linda Waite, professor of sociology, said “People who cohabit often contend that marriage is just about a piece of paper. We’ve found, however, that there is quite a bit of difference between being married and living together,” she said.

Today I am going to compare the pros and cons of cohabiting and marriage. I will also be sharing the results from two internet surveys that I conducted on the topic.


Cohabitation was illegal in America until 1970 and is still against the law in some states and is a trend that gets more popular as the years go by.

There are many reasons that couples believe that living together before marriage is beneficial. Cohabitation can be entered by anyone regardless of sexual orientation at any time, at any age, and with no formal requirements. Many young Americans choose to cohabitate as a test run for marriage, because it is more economical or because couples are the same sex and marriage is not an option unless you catch California on a good day.

More and more senior citizens are cohabitating to retain their social security and military benefits from their deceased spouse, for tax incentives and alimony, and to protect their assets for their children’s inheritance. A cohabitating relationship bears no legal responsibilities so if it fails, people can divide property as they see fit and there is no obligation for financial support unless paternity is proven after a child is born. Bedrooms tend to be more active in cohabitating relationships; according to the 1992 National Health and Social Life Survey, cohabiting couples have an average of about one additional sex act per month compared to married couples.


The dark side of cohabitating is that it is a very unstable living arrangement with more negative consequences than benefits. Men and women who cohabit are more likely than married people to experience partner abuse and infidelity and relationships can end just as spontaneously as it began. Accidental pregnancies are the highest among cohabitating couples since their recreation of choice is in bed. Researchers have discovered that children living in cohabitating households are prone to emotional, academic and behavioral problems. Cohabitation is commonly referred to as “living in sin” and although society is becoming more tolerant of this trend, family and friends tend to not take this type of union seriously and they pressure couples to commit.

Although some cohabitating couples end up in successful marriages, more often than not, marriage after cohabitating can doom a relationship. People in cohabitating relationships are apt to settle for someone that isn’t the right match out of feelings of obligation, guilt, fear of not being able to find someone better or folding under social pressure. Scott Stanley, author of The Power of Commitment, said “people who are cohabiting might end up marrying somebody they might not otherwise have married; they're "sliding, not deciding" Research has found that couples that cohabitate before marriage have up to two times the likelihood to divorce, compared to couples who don’t live together before marriage. Plus couples that lived together before marriage tend to have poorer-quality marriages and have reported less satisfaction, more arguing, poorer communication and lower levels of commitment than people that had never lived together prior to marriage.


Marriage has been universally celebrated throughout history. Researchers have found that married people tend to be happier than unmarried people for many reasons. Although frequency in sexual activity tends to decline after marriage, married couples report more satisfaction from sex and are more faithful than cohabitating couples. Children living in a married home fare better emotionally and academically than in any other living arrangement. In marriage, partners tend to work together as a team to manage the household and this arrangement is more satisfying and efficient than in a cohabitating relationship where they tend to work independently. Married people are accepted socially and family members are more likely to loan money and support them than couples that are merely living together. Information discussed within a marriage is legally considered confidential if a married couple claims the marital communications privilege in a court of law. If a spouse becomes sick, the other spouse is given full visitation rights and is allowed to participate in medical decisions and can qualify for sick leave from work to care for their ill spouse. Spouses are entitled to their spouse’s social security benefits, Medicare, tax breaks, and disability benefits from the government along with military benefits such as education, health care and special loans.

Everything has a shadow, a dark side, and marriage is not immune to this universal rule. In order to get married, couples must fulfill many legal requirements such as obtaining a license, giving blood, and must perform a ceremony given by an official clergy person or officer of the court and a witness. Marriage is not an option for same sex couples unless you catch California on a good day. The spouse that earns more money might be legally obligated to financially support the other spouse and the children after a separation or divorce. When you get married, there is a lot of social and family pressure to have children.


Now that we know the differences that research has found on the benefits and consequences of cohabitation versus marriage, I would like to share some research that I have conducted on the subject to see if age, sex and religion influenced preferences for cohabitation and marriage.


I surveyed 50 people of all ages online at Yahoo! Answers, www.answers.yahoo.com. I told them that some researchers say that living together increases the potential for divorce, asked them if they felt that couples should live together before marriage and obtained their sex and religious preference. People of all ages participated in this survey and 68% thought that it was a good idea to live together before marriage, 24% thought it was a bad idea and 8% were not sure. Out of the 28 Christian participants, 64% of them thought that cohabitating was a good idea and most were also involved in cohabitating relationships.


In conclusion, although all of the participants were informed about the destructive consequences that cohabitation provides, on average, people of all ages prefer cohabitation prior or in place of marriage regardless of religious orientation.


I was surprised that religion didn’t have a bigger influence in the opinions expressed in the Yahoo! poll so I decided to post the same survey at Christian Forums, www.christianforums.com, to see how much influence faith has on the preference for cohabiting. 81 people of all ages at Christian Forums participated in the survey. 81% of the people surveyed from this forum believed that people should not cohabitate before marriage, with only 9% saying yes and 10% were not sure. From these results I discovered that the stronger the faith, the likelier cohabitation will be rejected.


In conclusion, although all of the participants from both surveys were informed about the destructive consequences that cohabitation provides, on average, people of all ages prefer cohabitation prior to or in place of marriage regardless of religious orientation, unless they are devout and then the results are reversed.


Pamela Smock, sociologist from the University of Michigan, says "Cohabitation is not this bad little thing only a few people are doing. It's not going away. It's going to become part of our normal, typical life course--it already is for younger people. They think it would be idiotic not to live with someone before marriage. They don't want to end up the way their parents or older relatives did, which is divorced."


Today I have compared the pros and cons of cohabitation and marriage and shared the results of two surveys that I conducted and now that everyone knows the difference between being married and living together, I encourage everyone to carefully weigh the decision to cohabitate prior to marriage.


Marshall Miller, author of Unmarried to Each Other: The Essential Guide to Living Together as an Unmarried Couple said. "The most important thing is for people to treat moving in together as a serious decision, a major life choice," Miller says. "What does it mean to you both for the long and short term? If one person thinks living together means a quick path towards marriage and the other thinks it's just saving on rent and having a friend with benefits, there could be trouble. The important thing is to be on the same page."

 

[VozNocturna]

I worked in Linda Waite's office when I was an undergrad. She's not a Christian, but her research on cohabitation is definitely compelling.

My response is: heeeeck no! Been there, done that. When I was young, foolish and 21, I let my boyfriend talk me into living with him. We were already in sin. Anyway, it was a miserable three years. I was very confused because I didn't know whether to act as a girlfriend or a wife. The whole situation created a lot of confusion and resentment on my part. When ever I did anything that resembled a gesture of "service", or whenever he would ask me to do something that resembled anything wifely, I would recoil or do it with resentment. I refused to act as a wife because we weren't married on paper.

Being married allows you to freely serve one another without feeling like you're being milked because you've made a spiritual, verbal and legal commitment.

 

[JPPT1974]

My parents are glad that
My brother and sister didn't live together
They would forbade it all together
And they probably wouldn't like it at all
I wouldn't do that either
Don't want to compromise the Lord's teachings about couples!

 

[lovemysoldier]

I worked in Linda Waite's office when I was an undergrad. She's not a Christian, but her research on cohabitation is definitely compelling.

My response is: heeeeck no! Been there, done that. When I was young, foolish and 21, I let my boyfriend talk me into living with him. We were already in sin. Anyway, it was a miserable three years. I was very confused because I didn't know whether to act as a girlfriend or a wife. The whole situation created a lot of confusion and resentment on my part. When ever I did anything that resembled a gesture of "service", or whenever he would ask me to do something that resembled anything wifely, I would recoil or do it with resentment. I refused to act as a wife because we weren't married on paper.

Being married allows you to freely serve one another without feeling like you're being milked because you've made a spiritual, verbal and legal commitment.

I am surprised to hear that Linda Waite isn't a Christian after reading her research. I guess I just assumed that she was a Christian because of how strongly she is against it. I should know by now never to assume.

 

[VozNocturna]

I am surprised to hear that Linda Waite isn't a Christian after reading her research. I guess I just assumed that she was a Christian because of how strongly she is against it. I should know by now never to assume.

Lovemysoldier, if I remember correctly, Linda Waite is Jewish. I don't know to what extent her faith informed her research. However, as a well-known sociologist, I suspect Dr. Waite probably maintained a lot of objectivity in her research. She's strongly against it because the research speaks for itself. And she's a female scholar on a very liberal campus. What's funny is that in the same research office (the National Opinion Research Center/the Center for Population Research--I think they changed their name since I was a student there) there's another well-known sociologist who was doing a lot of research on American sexuality. His research is somewhat disturbing.

I think what probably what makes her research more "valid" and very thought-provoking both in the secular and religious world is that she does not rely on religious data. In my opinion, it further strengthens what the Bible has been saying for hundreds of years! I don't think that we as Christians should always set out to prove everything in the Bible, but it definitely helps when academic research supports some of the basic tenets of Christianity; it shows that there is definite logic and Truth to what we believe.

 

[JPPT1974]

Again absolutely positively not
Because that is against the Lord's will
For couples in His eyes.

 

[romaneagle13]

Is the issue:
(a) living under the same roof
or

(b) living under the same roof and sleeping together.

Answer (b) is a "no."

Answer (a) is trickier. Sometimes one half of the engaged couple will move to a new town before the wedding and the other half will follow later. It might be okay for them to live in the same house for a month or so before the wedding. This would save on one of them renting another apartment to live in. They would just be responsible to resist the tempation to sleep together.

See, this is exactly the situation I was in. My husband and I lived together when we were engaged, for about 9 months before we were married. I couldn't afford to live on my own after the move and he had a three bedroom house all to himself. I felt the need to move to be near him as we had not known each other very long (we got engaged three weeks after meeting in person only once!) and we were in a long distance relationship, due to the fact that I lived 3 states away from him.

As for whether that causes marriages to fail, I don't believe that it is entirely true. My husband and I have been married nearly 7 years now and we are very happy!

 

[JPPT1974]

Again not at all
It compromises the Lord's will
For couples to honor Him
By not living together until they are wed!!