In the article that I found by Frank Furstenburg it spoke about how the belief that the divorce rate will continue to increase by a major amount is unlikely. Throughout the article he speaks how this belief was formed when comparing the vast difference in certain periods of the past and how divorce rates have started leveling since the 1980's. The extreme growth in divorce rates was in a time where America was in a major change from traditional beliefs to what it is now and although the rate jumped drastically, the belief that it would continue to rise like this is very unlikely. He gave examples of how from 1965 to 1979 divorce rates nearly doubled but shortly after the rate started to level out. During the 1980's the rate dropped by nearly ten percent and during the 1990's it began rising again, and that is when the belief that rates would continue to grow was originated. Since that it would be very unlikely for something like that to happen again, according to Furstenburg, and divorce rates should stay balanced for the most part.
Things I learned/found interesting:
I was surprised at the statistic that divorce rates nearly doubled during the 1960's. I knew that the divorce rate grew rapidly during the sixties but I did not know that it was by such a great rate. I found this to be very interesting and is a statistic that I will probably never forget.
Discussion:
The question that I have for everyone is what they think about where they think divorce will be in the future. If the divorce rate will again rise by a drastic margin or if they believe that the rate will level out into the future. I think it would be interesting to see everyone's views on this.
I think the divorce rate will rise again, but I don't think it will be a drastic margin. I think society will develop some method to decrease divorces or to stop marriages that are most likely to fail. Also with this, if I recall reading something in our text book, the divorce rate has been hovering around 50% for a while now. I think that a 50% chance of avoiding a divorce is high, but I think that most people who go into marriages these days are aware of the possible consequences that they may experience. It think some enough people plan for the possibility of divorce and even talk about it before entering a marriage which is why this percentage of marriage has leveled off.
ReplyDeleteIt is tricky to predict where divorce will be in the future. As we've discussed in class and seen in the textbook, divorce rates have dropped since the 70s, which we can argue is because of the amount of time that people spend postponing marriage--making sure they're ready and want to get married and also in finding a true match instead of rushing into things because everyone else is. However, because of the laxity that the media has towards the significance of marriage and how easy it is to obtain a divorce these days, I can also see divorce rates spiking in the future--people might see it to be too time consuming and costly to try to work through their problems and take the easy way out by divorcing.
ReplyDeleteThese two theories could even out the divorce rate allowing it to remain consistent moving towards the future, I guess all we can do is wait and see!
I think divorce will definitely level out, I feel like most people will accept that divorce is a process of finding out about yourself and your relationships. I believe divorce will have less of a negative connotation as it does by the next "generation."
ReplyDeleteSteve Boser