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The Family Studies Center at BYU

Despite the discouraging evidence of the decline of marriage in our country, the majority of Americans still want to marry. If we understand the forces that are tearing apart our marriages or keeping us from marrying, we can increase our chances of raising happy, productive children and of being happy and productive ourselves. Our marriages can become a benefit to society, rather that a detriment.

It was with this hope in mind that the Family Studies Center at Brigham Young University was created in 1989. As an inter-disciplinary institution with over 75 research faculty members, the Center is the highest concentration of family-related scholars in the world. Research topics deal with specific issues regarding children, teenagers, parents, marriage, and family. The Center supports research in these areas in order to strengthen families by offering useful, accurate information and by providing practical tools for parents and couples to use when times get tough.

Some of these tools include: a quarterly publication entitled, Marriage and Families, which promotes strong, traditional families; several websites for pre-marital couples, husbands and wives, and one specifically for fathers (http://fatherwork.byu.edu); and finally, the Center was recently host to a national conference of the leading social science and legal scholars in the field of marriage. Dr. Alan Hawkins of the Center, and Prof. Lynn Wardle of the J. Rueben Clark School of Law organized and lead the conference in March 2000, which successfully set new research and legislative goals that will create stronger, healthier, happier couples and families. Information and speeches from the Revitalizing the Institution of Marriage in the 21st Century conference can be obtained through the Family Studies Center.

With an outstanding faculty and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Proclamation on the Family as their principle guideline, the Family Studies Center is sure to make a significant impact on the work done in the field of marriage, and consequently on the lives of individual couples.

1. Married: The proportion of adults currently married has declined from 66 percent in 1960 to 55 percent in 1998 for females, and from 69 percent in 1960 to 58 percent in 1998 for males.
2. Divorced: The number of divorced adults has risen from 2.6 percent in 1960 to 10.3 percent in 1998 for females, and from 1.8 percent in 1960 to 8.2 percent for males.
3. Never Married: The proportion of adults who have never married rose from 16 percent in 1970 to 23 percent in 1996; a percentage increase representing a doubling of the number of adults who never marry.
4. Cohabitation: In 1960, 440,000 unmarried couples cohabitated, compared to 4.2 million in 1998.
5. Out-of-Wedlock Childbearing: For births to unwed mothers across all ethnic boundaries, the rate has risen from 5 percent of all births in 1960 to 32 percent in 1998.
6. Single Parent Families: Since 1960, the proportion of children living in single-parent homes has tripled, rising from 9 percent in 1960 of all children to 28 percent in 1998.