Erica Rodriguez

Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race by Mamadi Corra, Shannon K. Carter, J. Scott Carter, and David Knox is an article that discusses the findings from the 1973-2006 General Social Survey that assessed the interactive impact of race and gender on marital happiness over time. The data for this study was collected from the General Social Survey (GSS). Participants were randomly selected, and are nationally representative of the English speaking adults that live in noninstitutional settings in the U.S. The dependent variable of the study was the question from the General Social Survey, "Taken things all together, how would you describe your marriage?". The answer choices included, very happy, pretty happy, or not too happy. This question was included in the GSS for twenty six years from 1973-2006. The independent variables include the main explanatory variable which was a social location measure (White husbands, White wives, Black husbands, and Black wives), work status of the respondent, whether the respondent was divorced or not, having a child under 18 currently living in the home, respondent's and spouse's employment status, age, education, income, and religiosity. All together, there was a total of 24,555 respondents who were included in the study. Of the 11,606 husbands, 41.4% were White and 4.2% were Black. On the other hand, of the 12,849 wives, 46% were White and 4.6% were Black. The remaining 3.8% of the respondents married were categorized as Other in the GSS. To assess the change over time, the study was split up into four decades.The findings from this study are significant, because the p value was below 0.05. The findings show that race and gender each have independent and significant effects on respondents who are White and male who reported higher levels of marital happiness than Black and female respondents. Out of the four racial groups, White husbands had the highest levels of marital happiness. From the 1990's to the 2000's Black wives' marital happiness increased. This could be due to higher rates of employment than White women, women not being viewed as an anomaly, and a sense of belonging in the workforce for Black women. Even though women are still unqual to men, women as a group have been gaining equality with men slowly. The study also shows us that marital happiness for White wives has not changed much over time, even despite their better access to jobs and their contribution to financial success in a family. For Black husbands, marital happiness has not increased at all since the 1970's, and it could be because of the high rates of unemployment and underemployment. One limitation that is worth noting from this study was that the survey only included one measure of marital happiness.

Marital Assimilation Among Hispanics: Evidence of Declining Cultural and Economic Incorporation by Daniel T. Lichter, J. Brian Brown, Zhenchao Qian, and Julie H. Carmalt is an article that documents the changes in the time frame of 1990 and 2000 of intermarriage patterns between Hispanics and non-Hispanic Whites. The data from the study in this article was collected from the 1990-2000 5 Percent Census Microdata Series from the Minnesota Population Center's Integrated Public Use Microdata Series. Non like the study in Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race, this survey was limited to 155 metropolitan areas containing at least 25 married couples having at least one Hispanic partner. The dependent variable is the metropolitan area prevalence of marriages between Hispanics and non-Hispanic Whites. This is called "Hispanic intermarriage". This is measured in 1990 and 2000, and is measured by the number of Hispanics married to non-Hispanic Whites divided by the number of the total number of couples that include at least one Hispanic partner. The study completed in the other article was nationally representative of English speakers living in noninstitutionalized settings, but this study is limited even more. Another limitation to this study is that the sample was couples with female partners aged 20-34. The results from the study show that from 1990 to 2000 Hispanic intermarriage decreased from 33 percent to 23 percent. When the study was restricted to 155 major metropolitan areas, there was an even larger decrease from 47 percent to 33 percent. The authors argue that the group differences in socioeconomic status and cultural assimilation affect the rates of Hispanic intermarriage despite any achievements among minority people. The study shows that Hispanic intermarriage declined in the 1990's. The unexpected declines during the 1990's were associated with the many factors that include growing spatial, cultural, and economic differences between Hispanics and other groups.

Jessica Donnelly Family quiz

Jessica Donnelly

Word Count: 519

            The article, Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race, 1973 to 2006, by J. Scott Carter, Shannon K. Carter, Mamadi Corra, and David Knox, examines the methods and findings of a survey regarding race and gender and their impact on marital happiness. The data was collected from the General Social Survey from the years 1973-2006. They collected responses from 24,455 married respondents. They respondents were randomly drawn adults, 18 years or older. The dependent variable in this survey was the question of how one would describe their marriage. The answer choices being "very happy," "pretty happy," or "not too happy." The information was divided into four decades. The independent variables in this survey were mainly sex and race, divided into four categories: White husbands, White wives, Black husbands, and Black wives. Other independent variables considered were work status, whether the individual had been divorced before, age of respondent, education, income, etc.

            The findings of this survey are supportive of the idea that race and gender have a significant impact on happiness within a marriage. Whites and males seemed to have higher levels of happiness, with White males being the happiest in marriage. This could potentially come from their position in the family, which is usually one of power. White wives did not have any significant increase in happiness over the years. Black husbands had a slight decrease in happiness over the years. The lowest happiness levels come from Black wives. However, they had a major increase in levels of happiness in the years 1990-2006. The reason for this increase cannot explained without further research. But these results show that the levels of happiness vary among different races and sexes.

            The article, Whom Do Immigrants Marry? Emerging Patterns of Intermarriage and Integration in the United States, by Daniel T. Lichter, Zhenchao Qian, and Dmitry Tumin, examines the methods and findings of a survey regarding intermarriage patterns between immigrants and natives. The data was collected from the decennial censuses. The data is from 2008-2012 in the American Community Survey. There were 86,124 different sex couples, each one containing a husband and wife in one record. Natives are defined as people born in the U.S. and immigrants are defined as foreign-born people. The hypothesis in this study states those with a minority, ethnic background is a barrier of marriage between native-born people and foreign-born. They are categorized into five groups: non-Hispanic Whites, non-Hispanic Blacks, American Indians, Hispanics, and Asians. Furthermore, the foreign-born respondents were categorized into national origin.

            The findings of this survey prove that the odds are 30 times greater for an endogamous relationship to occur than an exogamous relationship. An endogamous relationship in this case is defined as a relationship where both partners are of the same ethnic background and an exogamous relationship is one where they marry outside of their ethnicity. Percentages of endogamous marriages were highest among native-born Whites. Native-born Asian men had the highest levels of exogamy. Blacks and Hispanics ended up having a variance of levels of exogamy. Native-born Hispanic men are far less likely to be in an endogamous marriage than native-born Black men. Foreign-born Asian men proved to be the most likely to engage in an endogamous marriage. These results show a large variance across different ethnicities and races. They also support that marriage patterns change among the population, based on ethnicity and native origin.

Family Quiz SOC111 Jesse McClurkinJesse McClurkin SOC111 04/26/2018 Marriage And Family Quiz The articles being used for this comparison are “Comparative Patterns of Interracial Marriage: Structural Opportunities, Third-party Factors, and Temporal Change in Immigrant Societies” by Cardell K. Jacobson and Tim B. Heaton and “Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race, 1973 to 2006” by Mamadi Corra et al. These two articles were chosen because I intended to find out whether or not patterns of interracial marriages have a correlation to the rates of which people are finding happiness in their marriages. The “Comparative Patterns…” article used Canada, the United States, Hawaii (a special case because it is not its own nation), New Zealand, South Africa, and Xinjiang China as the participating populations for this study. This was done because those nations have varying ratios of minority to dominant majority (dominant meaning in terms of political rep

Jessica Notarnicola Family quiz

Jessica Notarnicola, 332 words

In the article, Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race, 1973 to 2006, the author's investigate variables that possibly contribute to marital happiness. The authors use quantitative data, using the General Social Survey as a source. They looked at survey questions concerning marital happiness and used the answers as data for their investigation. Their data found that those who showed reported having greater marital happiness were Whites and males, while those who reported low in marital happiness being Blacks and women, the biggest gap in marital happiness being between White males and Black Females. The author's also found that in more recent years, the gap of marital happiness has been closing due to the rise of marital happiness now reported by Black females. Some independent variables the authors used were education, income, children, employment, and if they were divorced. In sum, this research found that white males reported having the highest marital happiness, while black females reported as having the lowest marital happiness.

The second article I chose to read was Explaining Race and Ethnic Variation in Marriage: Directions for Future Research. In this article, the author's investigated possible variables that contribute to variation in marriage among Blacks and Whites, and also gave their thoughts in how further investigation could be improved, or the direction it can be taken. The article focused on comparing marriage variation in Blacks and Whites. They found that Whites were more likely to marry younger, marry into more stable relationships, and less likely to divorce than Blacks. In their research, they found possibly one of the more prevalent causes for differences between Black and White marriages could be due to the fact that in more urban populations, incarceration and unemployment are high for Black males, making them appear less appealing for marriage. In sum, the authors found in their research that there is a significant difference between Black and White marriages, and while there are possible factors that can contribute to this, some of the variables vary across different individuals and families, with which the authors call for more research to be completed before assigning a true factor.

Stephanie Martinez

Stephanie Martinez

328 Words

In the article "Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race," four subgroups were compared: White wives and husbands and Black wives and husbands. They used data collected from the General Social Survey from the years 1973 to 2006. The question they were asked was to rate how happy they were with their marriage, dependent variable. The independent variables included sex, race, work status, children, and religiosity. They discovered that happiness in marriage overall goes down in the 1970s before going back up in the late 1980s. The only group that did not increase were White wives. A conclusion that they reached was that husbands are overall happier than wives, White husbands being the happiest of all and Black Wives being the least. In the 2000s however, happiness for Black wives increased more than it did for Black husbands. They believe it is due to them gaining more quality and obtaining better positions in the economy.

The article "Whom Do Immigrants Marry?..," uses the ACS to analyze the marriage amongst immigrants and natives in the year prior to the survey. They seek to understand what classifies the immigrants who get married. They found that one-sixth of the marriages they gathered involved an immigrant. They concluded that intermarriage is based on things such as the length of time in the U.S., education, and citizenship process. When it comes to Hispanics and Asians, it was proven that an intermarriage was more likely when they had higher education. Also, as a person goes through the naturalization period, an intermarriage becomes more of a possibility. It is assumed that this is because they have a commitment to become American and there are many acquired rights as well. They also found that immigrants aren't really likely to marry a person who was also foreign born, especially true for Hispanics. Additionally, White immigrants are the most likely to get married to a native and Black immigrants are the least likely to do so.

Family Quiz Soc111 MW 1-1:50

Family Quiz

                                                                                                      Eunice Herrera, 597 words

In the article, Recent Changes in the Trends of Teen Birth Rates, Wingo et al. look at the number of births among teens and focuses on age, race, and Hispanic origin. In doing so, researchers are able to advocate for more contraceptive awareness to decrease the number of teen births. Researchers focused on the years 1981 through 2006. To fit the category examined, teens had to be from the ages 10 through 19 and residents of the U.S. This data was collected from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention through the National Vital Statistics System. Teen ages were separated into three sections: 10-14, 15-17, 18-19. In this research study white, black, American Indian/Alaska Native, Asian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic, non-Hispanic white, and non-Hispanic black teens were analyzed. Education levels and whether they were married or not were also examined. The number of teen births in every 1000 females was used as the unit of measurement for this research study which were determined with birth certificates. A joinpoint analysis of the data was used to examine yearly tendencies controlled by demographic variables such as race, age, education, and marital status.  Researchers found that in 1990 the amount of births grew to 533, 483 and fell in 2003 to 421, 241. When the results are looked at only by race, the number of births in each category were constant throughout 1981 to 2006. Whites had lower numbers in comparison to blacks and American Indian/Alaska Native. Aside from blacks, there were less than 2 in every 1000 mothers in the 10-14 age category. In this age group birth numbers grew throughout 1981 to 1989 and fell in the years 1994 through 2003. In the ages 15 through 17, numbers grew in 1986 to 1990 and  fell in the years 1994 to 2003. Birth rates increased in 1981 to 1988 and fell in 1991 to 2004 in the ages 18 to 19. For Hispanic teens data revealed lessening numbers in 1992 to 1998 and a rise for those that were 18 and 19 years old. There was a decline in every race group. Teen births fell over 50% in the ages 10 to 14, almost 40% in the ages 15 to 17, and 25% in the ages 18 to 19. 

Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race, 1973 to 2006,  collected data from the General Social Survey through the National Opinion Research Center. All participants had to speak English and had to be 18 and over. Information collected was divided into four sections: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. This study analyzed four groups which are white husbands and wives and black husbands and wives. Gender, age, race, work status, level of education, religiousness, wage were used as independent variables in this study. The number of participants in this study are 24, 455. About forty-one percent of these participants where white husbands and 4.2% were black husbands from a total of 11,606 husbands. Forty-six percent of the participants were white wives and 4.6% were black out of 12,849 wives. This study used mean totals as a unit of measurement of marital happiness. The results show from the four categories, white husbands were at the top for levels of happiness. White wives were the second happiest followed by black husbands and black wives at the bottom. Consequences of sex and race on levels of happiness were looked at. Researchers found that levels of happiness were lower when couples had underage children and higher when income was higher and the couples attended church.

Marcos Iraheta

Marriage has been an institution that has been around for a long period of time and while different cultures have used it for different reasons, happiness within a marriage is a factor that is not usually looked at. This undoubtedly varies by race and for different reasonings, as different couples expect different things from one another.

Mamadi Corra, Shannon Carter, J. Scott Carter and David Knox took a look at this in their study for Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race and discovered some significant findings. They used the General Social Survey and looked at trends from 1976 to 2006 for their research, using English-speaking adults in the United States that were living in noninstitutional facilities. They used data from 23 years' worth of questions, but broke it down into decades, with the dependent variable being the question that was asked: "Taken things all together, how would you describe your marriage." They also broke down the data to look at black and white husbands and wives, to see how they responded across time, using various independent factors like divorce, work status, age, education and income. Among the four groups they looked at, they found that black wives had the least levels of satisfaction in the time span and white husbands to have the most, meaning they were the happiest. Interestingly, they found black wives to have a significant jump in their level of happiness from the 1990's and 2000's, with more research being needed to asses why this happened. As far as white wives, their levels have not increased since the 1970's and black husband rates have decreased slightly since then.

In a study done by Zhenchao Qian and Daniel Lichter titled Social Boundaries and Marital Assimilation: Interpreting Trends in Racial and Ethnic Intermarriage, they looked at interracial marriages and how the trend has changed over the course of the past few decades. They used data from Integrated Public Use Microdata in the 1990 and 2000 census to distinguish between races and used currently married couples ages 20-34 for their study. They also limited marriages to people who migrated to the U.S. before age 20, to further differentiate marriages that may have happened overseas. Furthermore, they took a look at cohabitation patterns for couples in the same age range, excluding homosexual partnerships, to not complicate the study. Their findings saw that it was hard to determine very specific trends because of the re-classification of races in the 2000 census, though intermarriage between blacks and whites went unaffected during this period. African-Americans were actually the least likely to marry Whites, determined by their findings. Hispanics have the highest rates to intermarry with whites at every level of the study, with Asian Americans not too far behind. The only difference was in the level of education, which made Asian American rates higher. The more educated they were, the more they seemed to marry whites. This means that social mobility gave more opportunities to Asians and Hispanics to date and marry whites. American Indians also showed a high level of marital assimilation, according to their studies.