Given National Fatherhood Initiative’s (NFI) mission is to improve the well-being of children by increasing the proportion that grow up with involved, responsible and committed fathers, NFI was especially interested in providing the public with invaluable insights into a variety of issues that affect children. Because when fathers and children are disconnected, children fare worse, on average, across every measure of physical, economic, educational, and psychological well-being.
With one out of three American children living in father-absent homes, it is important for us to understand how the public views marriage, which arguably is society’s best “glue” to connect fathers to their children, heart to heart.
On the fatherhood front, this report certainly provides some encouraging news. Specifically, 97% of the survey respondents said that fathers are just as important as mothers for the proper development of children, and 89% said that, all things being equal, it is better for children to be raised in a household that has a married mother and father.
In closing, I am confident that you will read this report with great interest. I am also confident that some of the data will surprise you and that you will be inspired to continue to find ways to strengthen the institution of marriage so that our nation’s children can grow up in secure, stable homes with the love, nurturance, and support that they so desperately need.
Sincerely,
Roland C. Warren, President, National Fatherhood Initiative
It is also the case that a large percentage of American adults hold attitudes that, while not anti-marriage, are disturbing to supporters of marriage. For instance, while a large majority of adult Americans seem to reject unilateral no-fault divorce, a smaller majority of the survey respondents (59 percent) agreed that “Society would be better off if divorces were harder to get” (which suggests that a good many persons do not know how easy it is to get a divorce).
Only 41 percent of the respondents agreed that it should be harder to get a divorce if you have children, and only 44 percent agreed that, in the absence of violence and extreme conflict, parents should stay together until their children are grown. Forty-seven percent agreed that divorced parents can parent as effectively as parents living together, and 40 percent of the respondents agreed that couples should live together before they decide to marry. Obviously, the widespread support for marriage is not without qualifications.
Americans, according to what they say in response to survey questions, believe that marriage is very important–for themselves, for children, and for the society as a whole. The results from the National Fatherhood Initiative Marriage Survey (NFIMS) reported here add to an already large body of evidence that most adult Americans express distinctly pro-marriage attitudes and that very few espouse views that reasonably could be considered “anti-marriage.”
For instance, among the respondents to the NFIMS, large majorities agreed that, “All things being equal, it is better for children to be raised in a household that has a married mother and father “(89 percent), that “Fathers are as important as mothers for the proper development of children” (97 percent), and that “Couples who marry should make a lifelong commitment to one another, to be broken only under rare circumstances” (88 percent).
Furthermore, large percentages disagreed with such statements as “Marriage is an old-fashioned, outmoded institution” (88 percent), and “Given how long people are living these days, it is unrealistic to expect a couple to remain married to one another for life” (78 percent). Given these sentiments, it is not surprising that most respondents expressed negative attitudes toward divorce. For instance, 94 percent agreed that divorce is a serious national problem and 71 percent disagreed that “Either spouse should be allowed to terminate a marriage at any time for any reason.”
The latter percentage is especially important, in that it shows widespread disapproval of unilateral no-fault divorce, which exists by law in most states and exists de facto in most if not all of the others. The minority positions on each of these seven attitudinal questions are arguably “anti-marriage,” though it is likely that some persons who hold these attitudes would object to that label. At least, these attitudes show a lack of support for the institution of marriage that includes a strong norm of marital permanence.
Persons concerned about the state of American marriage often complain that these “anti-marriage” attitudes are held and promulgated by a “cultural elite,” who predominate in intellectual, academic, and media circles. This perception may be correct, but nevertheless, these attitudes are most common at the lowest educational levels (see Figure 1). And even among persons with less than 12 years of education, the average number (out of seven) of these attitudes expressed is just above one and well below two (see Figure 1).
Aside from education, the two strongest predictors of these attitudes are age and degree of religiosity (Figures 2 and 3). Young adults are more likely to embrace “anti-marriage” attitudes than older ones, and as would be expected, persons low in religiosity are more likely to hold anti-marriage views than are persons higher in religiosity.
