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The Case for Getting Married Young

theatlantic.com

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Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#41

Post by abduhl »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #26
kscaldef wrote: post #12

"Unmarried twenty-somethings are more likely to be depressed, drink excessively, and report lower levels of satisfaction than their married counterparts" Let's all say it together: Correlation is not causation.

Do you have a hypothesis why "happiness" would correlate with marriage without their being any causative relationship? Correlation does suggest causation though. Isn't it generally sound to assume causation until the position can be falsified?

Absolutely not as assuming causation implies you know the directionality of the relationship. Cancer correlates pretty well with old age but you'd be pretty silly to assume that it causes old age.

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#42

Post by refurb »

purplelobster wrote: post #7

You don't have to be married to be in a committed relationship. A large percent of couples (> 30%) in Scandinavian countries for example never enter into a marriage, or people might marry 5, 6, 7, 8 years after they're first together. In that sense the marriage is a capstone, but there is no difference between that couple and a couple that got married right away and have been together for 8 years.

In that sense the marriage is a capstone, but there is no difference between that couple and a couple that got married right away and have been together for 8 years.

I always laugh when I hear this. People also say "Marriage is just a piece of paper."

My answer is "tell that to judge when you want to get out of a marriage."

Does a marriage certificate make your relationship more serious? No. Are you entering into a legal contract when you get married? Yes.

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#43

Post by Contero »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #26
kscaldef wrote: post #12

"Unmarried twenty-somethings are more likely to be depressed, drink excessively, and report lower levels of satisfaction than their married counterparts" Let's all say it together: Correlation is not causation.

Do you have a hypothesis why "happiness" would correlate with marriage without their being any causative relationship? Correlation does suggest causation though. Isn't it generally sound to assume causation until the position can be falsified?

The causation could easily be backwards. Who wants to marry a depressed, unsatisfied drinker?

> Isn't it generally sound to assume causation until the position can be falsified?

Not really, no. Would you assume causation in the case of cereal consumption typically increasing 30% on the first Tuesday after a heavy rainfall? There are many similarly insane correlations that you wouldn't be so quick to assume causation about. It's biased to assume causation (based solely on statistics) when you want it to make intuitive sense.

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#44

Post by j4ke »

This is also my experience: I was 22, she was 19 (married 10 years now). We finished school (3 BS, 1 MS, and a PhD between the two of us) and worked before having kids. I feel like we got married before we were each too stubborn and set in our ways to change. We met in the middle and grew into a single individual, greater than the sum of its parts. My (non-scientific) feeling is that in general, those I know who waited to get married had a more difficult time assuming a new identity that incorporates another individual.

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#46

Post by largesse »

One thing that the article did not touch upon is that there seem to be health advantages for children who are born of young parents - they have better telomere length [1] and possibly greater longevity. When you add to that general issue of gene damage over lifetime and how it can impact the children we conceive as we age, it seems that nature favors young parents.

The problem is that our economic system favors delaying child-bearing in an unprecedented way. I wonder what it would be like if we inverted incentives and encouraged people to have kids very young, provided social and economic support, and a ramp up to high impact careers as their kids approached their teens.

[1] Paternal age at birth is an important determinant of offspring telomere length - http://hmg.oxfordjournals.org/content/16/24/3097.long

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#47

Post by purplelobster »

refurb wrote: post #42
purplelobster wrote: post #7

You don't have to be married to be in a committed relationship. A large percent of couples (> 30%) in Scandinavian countries for example never enter into a marriage, or people might marry 5, 6, 7, 8 years after they're first together. In that sense the marriage is a capstone, but there is no difference between that couple and a couple that got married right away and have been together for 8 years.

In that sense the marriage is a capstone, but there is no difference between that couple and a couple that got married right away and have been together for 8 years. I always laugh when I hear this. People also say "Marriage is just a piece of paper." My answer is "tell that to judge when you want to get out of a marriage." Does a marriage certificate make your relationship more serious? No. Are you entering into a l…

Does that legal contract affect your happiness? In general, no. If your culture tells you so, perhaps.

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#48

Post by inafield »

callmevlad wrote: post #4

In my family's culture (Russian Protestant), getting married early is not only common, but expected. My wife and I got married when I was 24, which was almost shocking in a community where the average was around 20. I've had many awkward conversation (of the "I will pray for you" type) with my grandmother, who sincerely believed I was making a huge mistake by choosing school instead of marriage. Personally, I feel li…

In 2009, my Great-Opa (1907-2010) asked me why it took my (then girlfriend) and I so long to decide to date and consider marriage, having met online 8 years prior and only 6mo earlier decided to start long distance dating. He met his first wife in his village around the age of 20 and was married 5 weeks later. And at his "advanced age" at the time, the village had been concerned he and his wife weren't going to find anyone to marry. She was 16 or 17 at the time.

Even at his advanced age, he had a great sense of humor. As we were leaving, he pulled my girlfriend aside and said with a twinkle in his eye, "Next time you come back, bring your husband!"

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#49

Post by kscaldef »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #26
kscaldef wrote: post #12

"Unmarried twenty-somethings are more likely to be depressed, drink excessively, and report lower levels of satisfaction than their married counterparts" Let's all say it together: Correlation is not causation.

Do you have a hypothesis why "happiness" would correlate with marriage without their being any causative relationship? Correlation does suggest causation though. Isn't it generally sound to assume causation until the position can be falsified?

Because unhappy people aren't fun to be around, so people don't choose to marry them? Or because depressed people are negative about their relationships, just like anything else, so don't see them as worth pursuing? It's really not hard to conjecture mechanisms for a correlation.

Re: The Case for Getting Married Young

#50

Post by kscaldef »

alexjeffrey wrote: post #2

as someone who got married at 21, I can honestly say it's the decision I'm most happy about in my life so far. However, we had been together for over 7 years by that point and I'd be very wary of advocating getting married young to everyone, as I know at least here in the UK there seem to be quite a few teenage/early-twenties couples who decide to get married after a few months to a year, and end up divorced 6 months…

> as someone who got married at 21, I can honestly say it's the decision I'm most happy about in my life so far.

One might hope that statement was true no matter what age you got married at.

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