Alexis Abdulian

498

            The first article is titled "Trends in Marital Happiness by Gender and Race 1973 to 2006" by Mamadi Corra, Shannon K. Carter, J. Scott Carter, and David Knox. The data used in the study was from the General Social Survey. The surveys were conducted from 1972 to 1994 and from 1973 to 2006. The dependent variable in this study is a question about how the person views their marriage. The responses they could give were not too happy, pretty happy, or very happy. They got a score depending on what their response was. The independent variables of the study were social location measure, employment, divorced or not divorced, whether the person has a child under 18, age, education, income, and religion/how religious someone is. Their study compares the marriage of whites versus blacks. The first figure shows that both white wives and white husbands reported a higher happiness level with their marriage compared to black husbands and wives. White husbands had the highest happiness rate, followed by white wives. Black husbands also reported more happiness than their wives. The first table shows that if they have a higher work status and have a child in their home that the status of marital happiness is a lot lower. Those who had higher incomes, educated spouses, and went to church often had a high level of marital happiness. The 75-and-older age group reported high marital happiness, and the highest marital happiness age group was 18-24. They concluded that race and gender have a high effect on marital happiness.

            The second article is titled "A Path Toward Interracial Marriage: Women's First Partners and Husbands across Racial Lines" by Rosalind Berkowitz King. This research was done using the data form the 1995 National Survey of Family Growth. The sample was of women from the ages of 15-44. They selected the race groups that had a minimum of 100 people observed. The races used were: White, Black, American Indian/Alaskan Native, Asian/Pacific Islander, Non-Hispanic Asian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic American Indian/Alaskan Native, Hispanic White, Non-Hispanic Black, and Non-Hispanic White. For those who responded that they were mixed race they received a 1, and those who said they weren't received a 0. They were asked about their first sex partner's race and their first husband's race. Other variables were parent's education, religious affiliation, how well they know English, and nativity. Age was another factor looked at, as well as geography. There are two dependent variables focused on in this study. The first variable was if their first partner was of a different race than they are. The second was if their first husband was a different race than they are. Non-Hispanic White women are one of the highest rates to marry within their own race according to the article. They also found that women that had college-educated parents are almost equally interracially married and never married, 30% and 31%. Those who married their first partner are two years younger than those women who married within their race.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

Corra, M., Carter, S. K., Carter, J. S., & Knox, D. (2009). Trends in marital happiness by gender and race, 1973 to 2006. Journal of Family Issues,30(10), 1379-1404.

King, R., & Bratter, J. (2007). A PATH TOWARD INTERRACIAL MARRIAGE: Women's First Partners and Husbands across Racial Lines. Sociological Quarterly, 48(2), 343-369.