Legalizing Same-Sex Marriage Matters for the Subjective Well-being of Individuals in Same-Sex Unions

Diederik Boertien () and Daniele Vignoli ()
Additional contact information
Diederik Boertien: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Demography, 2019, vol. 56, issue 6, No 5, 2109-2121

Abstract: Abstract We investigate whether the subjective well-being of individuals in same-sex unions improved following the legalization of same-sex marriage in England and Wales in March 2014. We employ repeated cross-sectional data from the 2011–2016 Annual Population Surveys on 476,411 persons, including 4,112 individuals in coresidential same-sex relationships. The analysis reveals increases in subjective well-being for individuals in same-sex relationships following legalization. Additional analysis documents higher subjective well-being for individuals in married same-sex couples compared with individuals who are in a civil partnership or an informal cohabiting same-sex union. However, the subjective well-being of individuals from same-sex couples increased after legalization among all subgroups considered, including those who cohabited informally. This result hints at a general reduction in structural stigma as an important mechanism behind the improved well-being of individuals in same-sex unions.

Keywords: Subjective well-being; Same-sex couples; Marriage; Structural stigma (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s13524-019-00822-1 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:spr:demogr:v:56:y:2019:i:6:d:10.1007_s13524-019-00822-1

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/13524

DOI: 10.1007/s13524-019-00822-1

Access Statistics for this article

Demography is currently edited by John D. Iceland, Stephen A. Matthews and Jenny Van Hook

More articles in Demography from Springer, Population Association of America (PAA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().