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The Childhood Living Arrangements of Children and the Characteristics of Their Marriages

Western Washington University

In this article, the author uses data from the 1995 National Survey of Family Growth to examine the impact of childhood living arrangements on the characteristics of marriages formed by womenbetween 1970and 1989.The focus is on sociodemographic characteristics of marriage that may be taken to indicate a heightened risk of marital stress or marital disruption. With the exception of parental death,it is foundthat any time spent in an alternative family increases the likelihood that a woman forms a union with characteristics that decrease the like-lihood of a successful union (i.e., women who experience parental divorce are more likely to cohabit before marriage). The author provides several theoretical alternatives for explaining the effects of childhood living arrangements. Two alternatives, selectivity and socialization, appear to be most consistent with the data.

Key Words: life course • childhood living arrangements • marriage

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