National estimates of the rise in serial cohabitation

Abstract

This paper provides new estimates of changing patterns of serial cohabitation, using data from the 1995 and 2002 National Survey of Family Growth. Serial cohabitation is defined as having multiple premarital cohabiting relationships. Analyses indicate that rates of serial cohabitation increased by nearly 40 percent over the late 1990s and early 2000s, and rates were especially high among young adults and recent marriage cohorts. A large majority of women – 75 percent – nevertheless lived only with men they eventually married. Although rates of serial cohabitation are higher among never-married women than ever-married women, there is little indication that single women – even older single women – have embraced serial cohabitation as an alternative to marriage or even as an intensive kind of dating. The results show that serial cohabitation is heavily concentrated among disadvantaged populations (e.g., women who grew up in single parent families). Early sexual activity and teen childbearing are especially important “risk” factors for serial cohabitation in the never-married population. There is little evidence, however, that recent shifts in the sociodemographic risk profile of the US population have been responsible for observed increases in single-instance or serial cohabitation. Increases in serial cohabitation have been broadly experienced across population groups in America.