“According to new research, the safest time to marry is in our mid-late twenties. Apparently, this ensures that the marriage will last and is less likely to end in divorce.”
Many people, regardless whether they’re single or taken, have an idea of the age they’d like to be when they get married. For most people, it’s an a period of their life in which they want everything on lock; career, house, car, family. Society’s ideals are already ingrained in the minds of young professionals, yet now it has been firmly solidified, leaving little room for them to maneuver.
Is there really an ideal age to get married?
According to new research, the safest time to marry is in our late twenties beginning thirties. Apparently, this ensures that the marriage will last and is less likely to end in divorce. Nicholas Wolfinger, a sociologist at the University of Utah, suggests that if couples surpass this window of time in which they marry they run the seriously high risk of divorce. It appears Wolfinger analysed data from the National Survey of Family Growth to produce the theory that the risk of divorce increases by 5% every year after the age of 32.
Wolfinger’s data is taken from the 1990’s. During this period the odds of divorce would actually decline the longer the person waited to get married, which somehow renders his theory and its data insufficient. Surely by waiting and getting to know the person would ensure a lower risk of divorce as both bride and groom know they want to spend the rest of their lives together. Unless this data is based on couples who have in fact been in short relationships and feel the marital clock i ticking, rushing into the ceremony without being truly sure it’s the right thing.
Whatever the criteria of the relationship, it seems this theory is simply a sweeping statement. In this day and age, we must know that the longevity of a marriage is not solely based on the age of the couple at marriage.