Study Finds Families Bypassing Marriage

          By ERIC NAGOURNEY

            The number of couples who live together out of wedlock, often with
               children, is increasing rapidly, a new study reports.

          The study, by a sociologist at the Institute for Social Research at the
          University of Michigan, reports that about two in five children will spend
          at least some time living with their mother and her unmarried partner.
          Less often, children will live with their father and his partner.

          "I think that the public will be surprised that almost half of all children will
          be likely to experience this type of household," said Pamela J. Smock,
          the sociologist who prepared the study.

          The report also suggested that the number of children believed to be
          living in single-parent homes may be significantly exaggerated. About 40
          percent of children born outside of marriage are actually living in homes
          with two adults, the report said.

          "A large share of children born to supposedly 'single' mothers today are
          born into two-parent households," Dr. Smock wrote. "Moreover, the
          widely cited increase in recent years in nonmarital childbearing is largely
          due to cohabitation, and not to births to women living without a partner."

          The study was an effort to bring focus to dozens of reports on the subject
          that have been done scattershot over the last decade or so. Drawing a
          broad portrait of the American family as it has been redefined since the
          1960's, the study found that cohabitation -- both before and in lieu of
          marriage -- has become so commonplace that it is practically the norm,
          and that it crosses most boundaries of age, income and race.

          The study is to be published this summer in the 2000 volume of the
          Annual Review of Sociology. Among its findings:

          •Fifty-six percent of all marriages between 1990 and 1994 were
          preceded by cohabitation. From 1965 to 1974, that figure was about 10
          percent.

          •From 1987 to 1995, the number of women in their late 30's who
          reported having cohabited rose to 48 percent from 30 percent.

          •Fifty-five percent of people who live together end up marrying, but 40
          percent later divorce.

          •Cohabitation does not mean childlessness. About half of the divorced
          people who live together have children in the household, as do 35
          percent of those who have never married.

          Experts generally agree about the main reasons for the rise in
          cohabitation.

• Some are obvious, like the cultural revolution that began in the 1960's,

removing the stigma from sex out of wedlock.

• But others go farther back, including a divorce rate that, while now level,

climbed over the last century. Children of divorce are less likely to marry and divorced
adults are more likely to live together than marry. The marriage rate in America
was 8.3 per 1,000 people in 1998, the lowest since 1958.

          Some sociologists, including Dr. Smock, said the fact that many children
          are, despite earlier assumptions, living with both parents did not mean
          they were living in stable households. They pointed to the generally
          short-lived nature of cohabitation, as well as to studies suggesting a
          greater level of discontent among people who live together than among
          married couples.

          It is not at all clear how the increase in cohabitation may affect society
          and the traditional role of marriage.

          Indeed, there is disagreement among sociologists over whether
          cohabitation is replacing marriage or simply serving as a new stage of
          engagement.

• A third view, less widely held, suggests that it may be a

henomenon affecting primarily single people who may never marry.

          The main effect, many sociologists agree, may well be on the growing
          number of children being raised in such households. Although only about
          11 percent of children are born to cohabiting parents, the number seems
          likely to increase.

          Complicating the ability to explain the social change, experts say, is that it
          comes against a backdrop of marriage itself being redefined. As women
          play a bigger role as income providers and more men assume child care
          duties, the traditional notion of a typical household has altered.

          "The underlying issue is whether we can gauge what cohabitation means if
          we are using a standard that is also changing," the report said.