I'd like to know the difference in divorce rates between couples who
have had marriage education and those who haven't. I need the
reference source listed. An overall statistic is good, and breakouts
by age religion, country, etc would be good but are not essential.

---

Request for Question Clarification by omnivorous-ga on 13 Oct 2002 15:18 PDT

Boomering --

There are suprises in every task that GA researchers take on but the
absence of studies on marriage counseling and its impact on divorce
rates is surprising.  I suspect that other GA researchers have found
the same -- that's why you don't have an answer yet.

It's surprising because multiple states have laws encouraging
"covenant marriages," which involved counseling beforehand.  Also,
President George Bush this spring encouraged spending on pre-marriage
counseling as part of the latest Welfare Reform Bill.

What sources there are supporting marriage education tend to come from
advocacy groups and are for locales with church-related programs.

If you'd like, I can summarize that data.

For you and GA researchers, my Google search strategy was:
"marriage counseling" + "divorce rate"
"covenant marriages" + "divorce rate"

Best regards,

Omnivorous-GA

Hi Boomering,

Written Testimony of John Crouch on Marriage Education in TANF
Reauthorization, April 11, 2002 has a report by Patricia Cullen, M.S.N
reprinted from Virginia State Bar Family Law News, Vol. 19 No. 3 (Fall
1999), pp. 3-4.
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/humres/107cong/4-11-02/4-11crou.htm

"In a five-year follow-up study, the researchers found that couples
who attended PREP had a divorce rate 50% lower than control couples
who did not. These findings have been replicated in other studies,
both here and abroad, and give cause for optimism about slowing down
the divorce rate."

This site also includes other references to studies that look at the
differences in rates of divorce between couples who take part in
preventive training.

There are several programs that are showing good results. The studies
have found that counseling before and during the first three years of
marriage has the biggest impact on divorce rates. Due to this, you'll
find that most of the studies concentrate on premarital/prenuptial
counseling.

Predicting Marital Success With PREPARE:A Predictive Validity Study 
http://psy.ucsd.edu/~eebbesen/psych18699/186Olsonstudy.htm
reports an interesting statistic. According to their research 10% of
the couples who went through the prenuptial counsling under study
decided not to get married. If that trend is replicated in other
research, it should have quite an impact on divorce rates.

The Journal of Marital and Family Therapy is a good reference for this
area of research. A lot of the articles are not online, but a visit to
your local research library should provide you with plenty of data.

American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy has a few
articles that may be relevant.However they do charge a fee to see the
full text. See: http://www.aamft.org/cgi-shl/TWServer.exe/Run:FTRUPD_2:TradeWinds_KEY=328

Search terms: Marriage counseling education communication comparative
divorce rates statistics

Although the break downs you would preferare not available, the data
is there. This should be an intersting field to watch,it seems that
research is starting to focus on this area witht the push for
intervention in social issues rising from divorce getting more
governmental attention.

Hope this helps.

bcguide-ga

I found a very good review of a lot of the research available - I will
add my comments here when I get home (I was unable to previously when
I first found it as the researcher add the question locked).

The way the UK state benefit system works means that this has been the
subject of research for many years. The government has a financial
interest in case funding marriage education is cheaper that dealing
with the after effects (e.g. medical problems from stress, emotional
problems for the children/adults in later life, the cost of court
time, benefits paid to single parent families and so on). The UK also
has a nationwide charity dedicated to relationship counselling (the
spelling 'counseling' is US specific and so missed much of the
research available I fear. However, religious differentation is less
likely in the UK.

One excellent summary is 

http://www.lcd.gov.uk/research/1999/299-6es.htm which was part of a
larger report on the subject which you may be interested in (
http://www.lcd.gov.uk/family/fundingmarsup/report.htm ).

If your work is going to be extensive into this area I suggest
contacting Relate ( http://www.relate.org.uk ) and One Plus One (
http://www.oneplusone.org.uk - they authored the LCD report and may be
able to help with the original date if for something like a thesis)
both of which could point you in the direction of numerous studies.

The Gottman Institute is the key research engine in the US for these
kind of studies (refered to in the LCD report) -
http://www.gottman.com/about/