"I have no idea:" Uncertainty in high school seniors' marital expectations.

Despite changes in marriage's role in young adulthood, youth in the United States report similar or higher expectations to marry than those from decades before, and very few report explicit expectations to not marry. Marital expectations may be one way to understand if the U.S. is indeed experiencing a second demographic transition, and uncertainty in those answers may provide additional information beyond simply yes and no. Using public-use data from 1976 to 2017 from the 12th Grade Monitoring the Future annual cross-sectional surveys, I found that young men and women were more likely to report uncertainty than explicitly expect not to marry, and that boys were generally more uncertain than girls. Slight changes in past decades suggest that boys are becoming more certain regarding marriage, however, and gender differences have diminished over time. Additionally, between 2008 and 2017, I found that boys with the greatest educational prospects were the least likely to report uncertainty about marriage. Uncertainty is common in adolescent marital expectations and should be considered as a possibly informative answer to questions about hypothetical marriages. Results suggest that marriage continues to hold strong meaning in adolescents' ideals.

Changes in expectations to marry and to divorce across the transition to adulthood.

Marriage and divorce expectations predict family life and personal outcomes. Understanding how expectations are associated with varying characteristics over emerging adulthood (ages 18-28) will inform understanding of emerging adult development. Panel Study of Income Dynamics Transition into Adulthood 2005-2015 data were used in hybrid-effects ordinal logistic regression to parse interindividual and intraindividual variation associated with relationship experiences, socioeconomic and contextual characteristics, and mental and emotional wellbeing. Partnerships were associated with optimistic expectations: both dating and cohabiting predicted greater marriage expectations and lower divorce expectations within individuals. Between individuals, greater time in full-time employment predicted more positive marital expectations, greater responsibility was associated with lower marital expectations, stronger religious identity predicted higher marital expectations and lower divorce expectations, having been arrested predicted greater divorce expectations, greater wellbeing predicted greater marriage expectations, and older age predicted lower marriage expectations. Both between and within individuals, greater worry predicted lower marriage expectations.

"Best-Laid Plans": Barriers to Meeting Marital Timing Desires Over the Life Course.

Most youth desire to marry, and often around a certain age, but many individuals marry earlier or later than originally desired. Off-time marriage could have consequences for subsequent relationship stability and mental health. Whereas barriers to marriage goals in the short term have been studied extensively, predictors of meeting marital timing expectations over the life course are less well understood. This study examined possible barriers, including socioeconomic characteristics and family experiences, both background and formation, to meeting marital timing desires by age 40 using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 cohort (NLSY79). Multinomial logistic regression revealed that greater education, religiousness, cohabitation, and premarital childbearing were associated with delayed or forgone marriage, but associations varied by gender and the age at which respondents stated their expectations.

Will I Stay Married? Exploring Predictors of Expectations to Divorce in Unmarried Young Adults.

Expectations that one may eventually divorce may predict behavior in young adulthood and beyond, but studies that have looked at individuals' assessments of their divorce likelihood have been limited. Guided by the expectancy-value theory of achievement motivation, we tested five categories of potential predictors of divorce expectations in a sample of 1,610 unmarried young adults from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics Transition to Adulthood study. Predictors were tested separately by gender and partnership status. Results suggested that some predictors mattered more for some groups than others, such as employment for single men, or certainty of marriage for partnered women. Consistent with prior research, caregiver divorce was significantly associated with expectations to divorce, but was only one of many factors found to predict these expectations. Socioeconomic factors and experiences and expectations of other relationships consistently predicted expectations. Expectations to divorce are multifaceted and complex.

Do Expectations of Divorce Predict Union Formation in the Transition to Adulthood?

OBJECTIVE: This study describes the association between explicit expectations to divorce and subsequent first union formation over the transition to adulthood (ages 18-28). BACKGROUND: Expectations for marriage in young adulthood predict union formation. Even before marrying, young adults may express a perceived risk of eventual divorce, and expectations of divorce may also have implications for union formation over the transition to adulthood. METHOD: Data from the 2005-2015 years of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics Transition to Adulthood Supplement (n = 2052) were used to estimate the association between expectations to divorce and entry into first premarital cohabitation and first marriage using discrete-time logistic and multinomial logistic survival models. RESULTS: As hypothesized, greater expectations for divorce predicted slower entrance into first marriage, even controlling for expectations for marriage and various sociodemographic characteristics, and predicted a greater likelihood of both remaining single and being first observed cohabiting instead of marrying in young adulthood for both men and women. CONCLUSION: Despite desiring to marry, young adults may delay marriage if they are concerned about their risk of future divorce.

Estimates of donated sperm use in the United States: National Survey of Family Growth 1995-2017.

OBJECTIVE: To provide national estimates of donor insemination (DI) use in the United States and a description of the population of users. DESIGN: Population estimates were generated from nationally representative data through weighted proportions and count estimates. SETTING: Not applicable. PATIENT(S): Participants were U.S. women of childbearing age (15-44 years) sampled for interview in the National Survey of Family Growth. INTERVENTION(S): None. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): Respondents who reported having received artificial insemination were asked the origin of the sperm. Responses could include husband/partner, donor only, or mixed donor and husband/partner. RESULT(S): In 1995, an estimated 170,701 (95% confidence interval 106,577-234,825) women had undergone DI using donor or mixed sperm. In 2015-2017, 440,986 (95% confidence interval 108,458-773,513) women were estimated to have used it. The DI users were mostly white, urban, older, college-educated, and had high family incomes. CONCLUSION(S): The DI use changed over time, from a decrease between 1995 and 2013 to a precipitous growth in 2015 to 2017. In recent years, nearly half a million women may be dealing with personal, relationship, and familial issues born of DI use. The United States does not maintain records on the usage of donor sperm, but better tracking of the use and outcomes of treatment would provide better estimates of the size of the affected population.

The intergenerational transmission of partnering.

As divorce and cohabitation dissolution in the US have increased, partnering has expanded to the point that sociologists describe a merry-go-round of partners in American families. Could one driver of the increase in the number of partners be an intergenerational transmission of partnering? We discuss three theoretical perspectives on potential mechanisms that would underlie an intergenerational transmission of partnering: the transmission of economic hardship, the transmission of marriageable characteristics and relationship skills, and the transmission of relationship commitment. Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 Child and Young Adult study (NLSY79 CYA) and their mothers in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (NLSY79), we examined the intergenerational transmission of partnering, including both marital and cohabitating unions, using prospective measures of family and economic instability as well as exploiting sibling data to try to identify potential mechanisms. Even after controlling for maternal demographic characteristics and socioeconomic factors, the number of maternal partners was positively associated with offspring's number of partners. Hybrid sibling Poisson regression models that examined sibling differential experiences of maternal partners indicated that there were no differences between siblings who witnessed more or fewer maternal partners. Overall, results suggested that the transmission of poor marriageable characteristics and relationship skills from mother to child may warrant additional attention as a potential mechanism through which the number of partners continues across generations.

Like mother, like child: Offspring marital timing desires and maternal marriage timing and stability.

Understanding the determinants of marital timing is critical because it has implications for marital functioning and divorce. One salient predictor of marital timing is youth's desires for marriage timing. To shine light on predictors of both desires for marital timing and the timing of marriage itself, we examine offspring marital desires and maternal marriage characteristics in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1979 (NLSY79) cohort and 1979 Child and Young Adult cohort (NLSY79-CYA; biological offspring of the women in the 1979 cohort). Analyses showed that maternal cohabitation postdivorce predicted decreased expectations to ever marry in offspring. Maternal age at marriage was positively associated with offspring desires for age at marriage, but only for those whose mothers had not divorced. Maternal marital age was significantly associated with the offspring's transition into marriage even when controlling for the offspring's desires for marriage timing, but neither maternal marriage age nor offspring desires for marital timing were associated with the timing of entrance into cohabitation, whereas maternal divorce was associated with earlier cohabitation. Our findings suggest that maternal marriage characteristics, particularly divorce, are significant predictors of millennials' desires for and experiences with romantic relationships. (PsycINFO Database Record