CV NEWS FEED // A recent Gallup poll found that married Americans are “thriving” at rates higher than divorced, cohabiting or unmarried Americans are.
According to an article that the analytics and advisory firm published in March. it found in its 2023 poll that there was a 16 percentage point difference between married adults (61%) and never-married adults (45%) who said they are thriving. Gallup surveys from 2009 through 2023 have consistently indicated that married adults are more likely, by between 10 and 24 percentage points, to report that they are thriving.
Gallup asked participants to indicate their level of happiness with life in general on a zero to 10 scale. Participants ranked both their current life and what they anticipate their life to be like in five years. The participants’ answers were classified as either “thriving,” “struggling” or “suffering” depending on the numbers they chose. Gallup classified participants who rated their current life at least a “7” and their near-future life at least an “8” as “thriving.”
In 2023, 61% of participants who are married, 48% of participants in a “domestic partnership,” 45% of participants who were divorced and 45% of participants who had never married were found to be “thriving.”
“The higher wellbeing of married adults relative to those who have never married can be found for men and women across all major racial/ethnic groups,” Gallup reported.
Age and educational levels did not explain the trends either.
Gallup noted that married couples are more likely to be practicing a religion. That factor is positively correlated with wellbeing, but people who are atheist or agnostic were also more likely to report they are thriving if they were married instead of unmarried, according to the article.
The report found that couples living with their children were more likely to report being “in a loving and supportive relationship” if the partners were married. Eighty-three percent of married couples, compared with 69% of people in a domestic and 61% in a non-domestic exclusive relationship, endorsed that statement.
It is also possible that married people have personality traits that help them have better lives and intimate relationships, but that does not necessarily fully explain the trends, according to the article.
“The institution of marriage — with its cultural, social and legal implications — likely affects behaviors and attitudes in important ways that enhance wellbeing. Through its formal and informal commitments, marriage raises the costs of terminating a relationship,” the article said. “Logically, this should encourage greater partner selection, as well as greater investments and effort to develop and maintain a high-quality relationship. The data on relationship quality and marriage are consistent with this prediction. Even apart from physical attraction, having a strong intimate relationship with another adult is widely regarded as a desirable situation, and marriage makes this more likely. Marriage also increases the likelihood of having children and is associated with better relationships with those children, as previous Gallup research has shown.”
