AMERICAN FAMILIESgreater longevity, with an average life expectancy
at birth of approximately eighty years for women
and seventy-three years for men who were born in
- When they reach the age of sixty-five, wom-
en who were born in 1991 can expect to live an
additional nineteen years, while men of that birth
cohort can expect to live fifteen more years (U.S.
Bureau of the Census 1996). (These figures are for
the total population. Life expectancies are lower
for members of racial and ethnic minorities.) In
contrast, the life expectancy at birth for those born
in 1900 was forty-eight years for women and forty-
six years for men (Grambs 1989). Unsatisfactory
marriages that formerly may have been terminat-
ed by the death of one partner are now more likely
to be dissolved by divorce (Uhlenberg 1986). Schol-
ars have also noted the apparent connection be-
tween women’s increasing levels of labor-force
participation and the increased rate of divorce in
the United States. Divorce is more likely to occur
in couples where the wife is able to support herself
financially.
The risk of divorce also varies with age at
marriage, duration of the marriage, education,
race, and ethnicity. Age at marriage is one of the
most important factors, with the likelihood of
divorce twice as great among couples where the
wife was seventeen or younger than among cou-
ples where the wife was in her early twenties.
Further, most divorces take place within the first
few years of marriage. The longer a couple has
been together, the less likely they will be to get
divorced. This pattern also holds among couples
in which one or both partners have remarried.
Education also seems to be an important factor,
with a higher divorce rate observed among high
school dropouts than among college graduates.
However, the effect of education is due in large
part to the fact that college graduates tend to
marry at later ages. Looking across racial and
ethnic groups, the risk of divorce is greater among
African Americans than among whites, and espe-
cially high divorce rates are observed for Hispanics
(Puerto Ricans in particular), Native Americans,
and Hawaiians. Divorce is less common among
Asian Americans (Sweet and Bumpass 1987).
Widowhood. Rising life expectancies have in-
creased the average age of widowhood. Among
women, the median age at widowhood was fifty-
one in 1900, compared to sixty-eight in 1979. The
median age at widowhood for men was forty-five
in 1900 and seventy-one in 1979 (Grambs 1989).
Lower average ages of bereavement for men com-
pared to women in 1900 are linked with women’s
risks for death in childbirth in that era. Women
today can expect to live longer in a widowed status
compared to widowed men. This gender gap is
explained primarily by higher female life expect-
ancy and lower rates of remarriage among women,
and also because women tend to marry men sever-
al years older than themselves. Nearly one-half (45
percent) of all American women who are age sixty-
five or older are widowed, while 15 percent of men
in this age group are widowed. Among the oldest-
old—those who are eighty-five years of age and
older—these figures rise to 77 percent for women
and 42 percent for men (Lugaila 1998).Remarriage. Due in large part to the fact that
widowhood tends to occur later in life, fewer men
and women remarry following the death of a
spouse, compared to those who remarry following
a divorce. Most people who divorce eventually
remarry, but the likelihood of remarriage varies
greatly according to gender, age, and race. Ap-
proximately five out of six men eventually remarry
following a divorce, compared to two out of three
women who do so (Cherlin 1992). As noted above,
men are also more likely than women to remarry
following the death of a spouse. The probability of
remarriage declines with age, especially among
women. Only one in four women who divorce at
age forty or older eventually remarry (Levitan, Sar,
and Gallo 1988). Race differences also are ob-
served for remarriage. The proportion of women
who remarry following divorce is approximately
50 percent for African Americans and 75 percent
for whites (Bumpass, Sweet, and Castro Mar-
tin 1990).Increased rates of divorce and remarriage are
transforming American families. ‘‘Blended’’ fami-
lies or stepfamilies are becoming increasingly com-
mon, whereby one or both spouses bring children
into a remarriage. One in four children will spend
some time in a blended family (Furstenberg and
Cherlin 1991). Nearly all of these children live with
their biological mothers.Household Structure. As defined by the U.S.
Bureau of the Census, ‘‘family households’’ con-
tain persons who are related to the household
head (the person in whose name the home is