Dr Paul Allen

Premarital Sex in America by Mark Regnerus and Jeremy Uecker and was pleasantly surprised at some of the insights. While I have been writing, teaching, and speaking for years to both teens and adults on the issue of premarital sex, this book opened my eyes to some of the more important trends emerging today.  The empirical data suggests that these are not true most of the time. There are exceptions, of course. MYTH 1: Long-term relationships are a thing of the past Many emerging adults (ages 18-23) tend to hold two views in tension—that sexual experimentation is valuable and yet one should not cheat on a monogamous partner. Indeed, many consider it stupid and unhealthy not to be sexually active in various relational settings. And yet most desire a lasting exclusive relationship. According to the research of Regnerus and Uecker, at least 50 percent of marriages last a lifetime, despite what most emerging adults tend to think. MYTH 2: Sex is necessary to maintain a struggling re...

Marriage and divorce rates in New Zealand (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Marriage and divorce rates expressed as percentages of the Australian population at the time. Based on statistics from the ABS 2008 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Divorce Rates in Sweden 2000- 2010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) AT 32, one of my clients (I’ll call her Jennifer) had a lavish wine-country wedding. By then, Jennifer and her boyfriend had lived together for more than four years. The event was attended by the couple’s friends, families and two dogs. When Jennifer started therapy with me less than a year later, she was looking for a divorce lawyer. “I spent more time planning my wedding than I spent happily married,” she sobbed. Most disheartening to Jennifer was that she’d tried to do everything right. “My parents got married young so, of course, they got divorced. We lived together! How did this happen? Cohabitation in the United States has increased by more than 1,500 percent in the past half century. In 19...

Image via CrunchBase The belief that living together before marriage helps to avoid divorce is “contradicted by experience,” says a  New York Times Op-Ed  by clinical psychologist Dr. Meg Jay, published this past Saturday. Jay, a specialist in young adult development, professes to be “neither for or against” co-habitation , but offers a searing critique of the practice , which she says is becoming “a norm” among young adults. According to her article, the phenomenon has increased by more than 1500% since 1960, when there were about 450,000 unmarried couples living together. There are now over 7.5 million such couples. Dr. Meg Jay Recent studies have indicated that there is a causal relationship between the rise in divorce that has accompanied the rise in co-habitation, says Jay. In the past, she notes, some researchers have rejected the suggestion that cohabiting can actually cause divorce, attributing the correlation between the two to “selection, or the idea that coha...

Image via Wikipedia Glenn T. Stanton has made a career studying the role of families in our society—both as a consultant in the George W. Bush administration and today as director for family formation studies at Focus on the Family . His latest book,  The Ring Makes All the Difference: The Hidden Consequences of Cohabitation and the Strong Benefits of Marriage  (Moody), explores the many downsides of an increasingly popular practice among young couples: living together before marriage. Caryn Rivadeneira, an author and regular contributor to the CT women's blog, Her.meneutics, spoke with Stanton about his research findings and why they matter to men, women, and children. Why did you focus on the scientific data about the dangers of cohabitation, rather than Scripture ? There's a natural theology in creation that we need to observe. My use of science and data is a pounding on the pulpit. As Christians we read out of two books: the book of Scripture and the book of nature. Th...

Hi all, I'm so excited to have Brad Wilcox with us today. As  you've probably heard and read, the rate of American couples who live together without being married are rising dramatically -- it grew 13 percent in 2010 alone.  And while it may be a simpler, more convenient arragement for many couples, that doesn't mean it's without complexity -- especially when the couples break up.   Wilcox's report deals particularly with the ramifications cohabitation can have on children.  We'd love to get your thoughts and questions on this societal shift.  Has it worked for you?  Do you see risks? I'm also working on an upcoming story about the potential pitfalls of cohabitation, so if you have stories you're willing to share, I'd love to hear from you: mccarthye@washpost.com.  Okay, let's get going! –  September 09, 2011 12:58 PM  Permalink Q . Brad, maybe you could start by telling us a little about the report.  Has cohabitation always shown ...