Do Marriage and Cohabitation Provide Benefits to Health in Mid-Life? The Role of Childhood Selection Mechanisms and Partnership Characteristics Across Countries
Brienna Perelli-Harris (),
Stefanie Hoherz,
Fenaba Addo,
Trude Lappegård,
Ann Evans,
Sharon Sassler and
Marta Styrc
Additional contact information
Brienna Perelli-Harris: University of Southampton
Stefanie Hoherz: University of Southampton
Trude Lappegård: University of Oslo
Ann Evans: Australian National University
Sharon Sassler: Cornell University
Marta Styrc: University of Southampton
Population Research and Policy Review, 2018, vol. 37, issue 5, No 3, 703-728
Abstract:
Abstract Extensive research has found that marriage provides health benefits to individuals, particularly in the U.S. The rise of cohabitation, however, raises questions about whether simply being in an intimate co-residential partnership conveys the same health benefits as marriage. Here, we use OLS regression to compare differences between partnered and unpartnered, and cohabiting and married individuals with respect to self-rated health in mid-life, an understudied part of the lifecourse. We pay particular attention to selection mechanisms arising in childhood and characteristics of the partnership. We compare results in five countries with different social, economic, and policy contexts: the U.S. (NLSY), U.K. (UKHLS), Australia (HILDA), Germany (SOEP), and Norway (GGS). Results show that living with a partner is positively associated with self-rated health in mid-life in all countries, but that controlling for children, prior separation, and current socio-economic status eliminates differences in Germany and Norway. Significant differences between cohabitation and marriage are only evident in the U.S. and the U.K., but controlling for childhood background, union duration, and prior union dissolution eliminates partnership differentials. The findings suggest that cohabitation in the U.S. and U.K., both liberal welfare regimes, seems to be very different than in the other countries. The results challenge the assumption that only marriage is beneficial for health.
Keywords: Marriage; Cohabitation; Partnership; Health; Cross-national (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1) Track citations by RSS feed
Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11113-018-9467-3 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:poprpr:v:37:y:2018:i:5:d:10.1007_s11113-018-9467-3
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... es/journal/11113/PS2
DOI: 10.1007/s11113-018-9467-3
Access Statistics for this article
Population Research and Policy Review is currently edited by D.A. Swanson
More articles in Population Research and Policy Review from Springer, Southern Demographic Association (SDA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().