I was discussing this very same topic with a coworker of mine who got married at 20. Most of my friends have gotten married between the ages of 19-24, so it is an interesting spin. In the church we are pretty much raised to think that you get married, and the sooner the better. I think trends have changed a little bit in the last few years, although, not evident in the examples of my friends...
Basically, we are groomed as Young Women to become wives and mothers. I'm not against this. In fact, I am very much a fan of traditional roles as a wife and mother - and yet, I think it puts a skewed perception on what college is for. Young Men are taught that they are to go on a mission and then immediately start searching for a spouse, who typically happens to be an itty-bitty freshman on campus.
For those of us who make it past graduation without a husband or wife in tow, I think the question is often asked, "What's wrong with you?" I don't think there is anything wrong, of course (or not always) but more that we are starting to take other things more seriously. An education is critical to be successful. Life experiences like studying abroad, or traveling for internships, or just living life before settling down is becoming increasingly more important. On top of that I think we are beginning to realize that this decision that some people have come to decide at 19 and 20 has eternal consequences. When we get married in the church, we are getting married for eternity! And I don't think that is a choice we should be making without very serious reflection (not that my friends didn't take the time to realize this... only, sometimes I wonder how much hormones were involved over the actual realization of the fact).
So is it so bad that we are getting married a little later in life? I've heard talk of this in church about how we get married younger because we know that marriage is important, etc. And that those that are putting marriage off are secular and of the world and things like that. I have to disagree. The church seems to be following a similar pattern. I've lived in two wards where the median age is 25 or older, and we are all single. I think this is a sign that marriage is being taken more seriously. And I think I am finally going to make it to 25 without being thought an old-maid because I'm still single.
Emily Becker wanted to be married by age 30. In June, at age 28, she and Joe Becker, 29, were married. They were the last of their group to tie the knot.
Even though they began dating in 2003 — around the same time as most of their friends — "it took us almost twice as long to get married," she says. "We both knew we wanted to marry each other. We just kept having to put it off."
The reason? Careers. Both are doctors. They spent four years in medical school. Three years of residency were in different cities. They got engaged in October of last year and now live in San Francisco.
"If we had been together in the same city, I think maybe we would have married sooner," he says.
Like many young adults today, the Beckers waited to marry until they felt the time was right. Others are also holding off while maintaining a single-but-together status that can last years. That may be one reason the age at first marriage has been climbing steadily for all racial, ethnic and socioeconomic groups. The median age is now the oldest since the U.S. Census started keeping track in the 1890s: almost 26 for women and almost 28 for men.
And as young people wait longer to marry, there is growing debate over whether waiting is a good idea, and if so, how long is best. Those who advocate marriage in the early to mid-20s say that's the age when the pool of possible mates is larger, it's when couples can "grow up" together and it's prime for childbearing. But others favor the late 20s or early 30s, saying maturity makes for happier unions and greater economic security — both of which make divorce less likely.
As a result, researchers, sociologists and family experts are taking a closer look at the attitudes behind the trend to see if there really is an optimum age to marry that maximizes the benefits of matrimony and minimizes possible problems.
"It's better not to get married as a teenager," says sociologist Andrew Cherlin of Johns Hopkins University. "Beyond that, I don't think there's an ideal age."
But people do have opinions about it, and those beliefs are clearly changing. In a 1946 Gallup Poll, most found the ideal age to be 25 for men and 21 for women. Sixty years later, in a Gallup telephone poll of about 500 adults, the ideal age had increased to 25 for women and 27 for men.
"A lot of girls have this ideal age for when they want to get married, but a lot don't vocalize it because you don't want to jinx yourself," says Jessica Lim, 30, a graphic designer in New York.
"For me, the ideal age was around 28. I think I was wanting to meet that goal and feeling like I needed to be there at 28, where my fiancé, who is just a few years older than me, wasn't there yet."
It's well documented that those who marry before age 20 are two to three times more likely to divorce, researchers say. But studies are still trying to determine whether marrying at certain ages may improve relationships and help marriages survive.
A study being drafted by sociologist Norval Glenn of the University of Texas-Austin finds that those who marry in the early to mid-20s are slightly happier and less likely to break up than those who marry in the later 20s, but are significantly more satisfied with their relationships than those who marry at 30 or older.
Older may be better
But research by sociologist Paul Amato of Pennsylvania State University for a 2007 book he co-wrote suggests quite the opposite. The studies for Alone Together: How Marriage in America Is Changing used different data and different criteria and found distinct benefits to marrying older.
"We found that the delay in marriage was actually a good thing and it actually improved the average marital quality by a fair amount," he says.
"Older marriages (30s vs. 20s) were more cohesive in the sense they did things more often together as a couple. And couples who married at older ages were less likely to report thinking about divorce or that their marriage was in trouble."
Two yet-unpublished papers co-written by Jason Carroll, an associate professor of family life at Brigham Young University, reviewed data collected in 2004-06 based on student questionnaires of 448 items. One study of 788 college students ages 18-25 from five campuses across the country analyzed marriage readiness by asking "Do you think that you are ready to be married?" Most weren't: 60% of men and 67% of women answered "no," and only 9% of men and 5% of women said "yes." Almost one-third of men and 28% of women said "in some ways yes, in some ways no."
The other study asked young adults and their parents about the best age to marry. The sample of 536 students from the five campuses said 25 was ideal, while parents — 446 mothers and 360 fathers — said 26 was better.
Debra Lermitte of Abington, Pa., has four children and two stepchildren, 26 to 31. She first married at 19 and was divorced after 15 years. She says it's better to wait: "You get to experience life and know yourself better, and hopefully choose someone more compatible once you become your own person as an adult."
That's the message Jamie Hayworth, 25, says she received from her parents. A mental health therapist in Torrance, Calif., Hayworth earned her graduate degree in June. She and her fiancé became engaged in February. Hayworth says she used to worry that she would be too selfish to be married.
"I just felt like for me, I was still thinking in terms of, 'What do I want to do with my life? What do I want to accomplish? Where do I want to live?' " she says.
This relatively new clash between marriage and individualism is discussed in Cherlin's new book —The Marriage-Go-Round: The State of Marriage and the Family in America Today, to be published in April.
Not until they're 'ready'
"People are more concerned with their own self-development than they used to be," Cherlin says. "People are postponing marriage until everything in their lives is working in order. The order means after you've finished your education, perhaps after beginning your career, and increasingly after you've lived with your partner. They're postponing marriage until they think they're ready for it."
Brian Benator, 23, an assistant men's basketball coach at North Georgia College and State University in Dahlonega, Ga., graduated in May from the University of Georgia and is pursuing an MBA while working full time.
His focus is on career and financial stability; marriage is not on his mind just yet.
"I think a year or two after college is the time to learn about yourself personally, as well as in the working environment," he says. "Hopefully, I'd like to be settled in the next six years, but it's easier said than done because I'm going to be moving all the time."
Marriage used to be the first step into adulthood, but now it is often the last, which Cherlin says has some implications: A lower proportion of today's young adults will ever marry (though most still will), and they likely will have fewer children.
"I'm not one who thinks waiting to marry is causing a problem here. I think the lives of today's young adults are becoming better and their marriages are becoming more stable. Where I see a potential crunch is young adults who want to have more than two children," he says.
Those who do worry include John Van Epp, a clinical counselor in Medina, Ohio, and family therapist Alan Singer, who has offices in New York City and Highland Park, N.J. Both say many young adults view marriage as something in the distant future.
Van Epp presented a program this summer about the repercussions of marrying in the late 20s and early 30s. Singer's blog urges parents to change the wait-to-marry message. He's particularly worried that medical advances in treating infertility are giving couples the wrong idea.
"It gives people confidence — almost invincibility — that we can delay these things and science will rescue us," he says.
Fertility researcher Richard Paulson of the University of Southern California says that, as a general rule, women should start having children no later than age 30 and be done by 35, when statistics show fertility declines.
The federal government is also taking new interest in these young adults. The National Healthy Marriage Resource Center, a government-supported clearinghouse, hired a market research firm to survey 3,600 adults ages 18-30 and will target that demographic with a website expected to launch next year.
Although preliminary, the data have identified distinct but very diverse attitudes, ranging from those who can't wait to marry to those who are afraid to marry and others in between. Just over 20% of those sampled have very low motivation for marriage; they view it as a risk that interferes with their independence or they were fearful of divorce.
Researchers say divorce rates are down for the better-educated. Those with college degrees marry later, have better jobs and more income. But an analysis of 2006 Census data by the American Council on Education finds that only 35% of those 25-29 have an associate's degree or higher.
The Beckers' extended education may bode well for their marriage, even though Emily Becker says it's tough to see their friends already settled with kids as the Beckers just begin married life.
"I've now found out marriage is such a wonderful thing, I wish people would have told me to get married sooner because I had found the right guy," she says. "But I'm actually glad we waited because we knew what we were getting into."
