Millennial marriage: like mother, like child.

PositionSociology

Sons and daughters of mothers who tied the knot young are more likely to want to marry early, too, but only if mom stayed married, says a study in the Journal of Family Psychology. Millennials whose mothers divorced tend to want to move more slowly, perhaps in the interest of avoiding the mistakes of their parents. Children whose moms wed young and stayed married are eager to marry in their late teens or early 20s themselves--not so, however, for sons and daughters whose mothers married young but then divorced; they still overwhelmingly hope to marry, but they want to do it later.

The later marital expectations for kids of divorced moms may hold some good news, suggests lead author Rachel Arocho. "Those who wait longer are more likely to have lasting unions when--and if--they do marry. For those parents who divorced, it is kind of nice to think that your offspring may avoid the same problems by taking longer to find a partner."

Kids of moms who moved in with a partner after divorce have lower expectations that they ever will marry. "That may be because they have seen that marriage is not the only pathway for a committed romantic relationship," notes senior author Claire Dush.

The researchers used data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979, a survey of people who were between 14 and 21 years old when they were first interviewed in 1979, and from...

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