TY - JOUR
T1 - Living together in Australia
T2 - Qualitative insights into a complex phenomenon
AU - Carmichael, Gordon A.
AU - Whittaker, Andrea
PY - 2007/11
Y1 - 2007/11
N2 - This paper mines data from in-depth interviews on family formation with 115 women, men and couples of family-forming age in eastern Australia to examine aspects of the complex phenomenon of living together unmarried. Sixty-five percent of interviews yielded evidence of one or more such relationships entered over approximately a 20-year period. Informants had rarely made considered 'decisions' to cohabit. Moving in had rather just happened', often after couples were 'sort of living together anyway through regularly staying over with one another. What tended to be transitions rather than datable events were widely perceived to be 'natural progressions', and motives for them were typically more pragmatic than emotional. The notion of cohabitation as trial marriage did not resonate widely among cohabiters, but did appear to have aided increasing parental acceptance of the lifestyle. Non-cohabiters mostly cited religious beliefs, a desire not to offend parents or a view that by marrying directly they had shown greater commitment as reasons for not having lived together. Youthful entry to cohabiting relationships seems frequently to presage their dissolution as 'growing up' relationships in a climate that increasingly eschews serious family formation until some years later in life. Transitions to marriage, which remains a highly symbolic act of commitment despite being seen in some quarters as irrelevant, have a variety of triggers. Prominent among them are decisions to have children (notwithstanding widespread childbearing within cohabiting unions) and the age-old prerogative of a male to propose marriage as the mood takes him.
AB - This paper mines data from in-depth interviews on family formation with 115 women, men and couples of family-forming age in eastern Australia to examine aspects of the complex phenomenon of living together unmarried. Sixty-five percent of interviews yielded evidence of one or more such relationships entered over approximately a 20-year period. Informants had rarely made considered 'decisions' to cohabit. Moving in had rather just happened', often after couples were 'sort of living together anyway through regularly staying over with one another. What tended to be transitions rather than datable events were widely perceived to be 'natural progressions', and motives for them were typically more pragmatic than emotional. The notion of cohabitation as trial marriage did not resonate widely among cohabiters, but did appear to have aided increasing parental acceptance of the lifestyle. Non-cohabiters mostly cited religious beliefs, a desire not to offend parents or a view that by marrying directly they had shown greater commitment as reasons for not having lived together. Youthful entry to cohabiting relationships seems frequently to presage their dissolution as 'growing up' relationships in a climate that increasingly eschews serious family formation until some years later in life. Transitions to marriage, which remains a highly symbolic act of commitment despite being seen in some quarters as irrelevant, have a variety of triggers. Prominent among them are decisions to have children (notwithstanding widespread childbearing within cohabiting unions) and the age-old prerogative of a male to propose marriage as the mood takes him.
KW - Alternative to marriage
KW - Cohabitation
KW - Complexity
KW - Living together
KW - Parental influence
KW - Pragmatism
KW - Relationship dissolution
KW - Transition to marriage
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=36649029922&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.5172/jfs.327.13.2.202
DO - 10.5172/jfs.327.13.2.202
M3 - Article
SN - 1322-9400
VL - 13
SP - 202
EP - 223
JO - Journal of Family Studies
JF - Journal of Family Studies
IS - 2
ER -