Marriage Success Related to How Long you Dated

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“You can have a happy marriage after any length courtship,” says Ted Huston, Ph.D., professor of human ecology and psychology at the University of Texas. However, not every tempo is created equal. Huston has spent 15 years studying the relationship between courtship length and marital success and has found that the closer a couple’s courtship is to average length (two years, four months), the more successful the union.
While both very fast and very slow to marry couples are more likely to divorce than couples with an average-length courtship, the whirlwind pairs tend to remain married longer than the feet-draggers, staying hitched more than seven years on average. Why? “They start off on such an emotional high of passion that they’re reluctant to give it up when problems arise,” Huston says. The drawn-out-courtship couples, on the other hand, “often hope marriage will improve their relationship, and when it doesn’t, they quickly conclude it isn’t going to work,” he says.

If You Dated Less Than One Year
Who plunges into marriage after dating a year or less? Couples who marry quickly fall into one of two camps: Some are ultra-passionate and impulsive pairs, who top a torrid romance with rushed nuptials; the others are pragmatic, cut-to-the-chase couples, who may be on a timetable (due, say, to a biological clock), explains Tina Tessina, Ph.D., author of How to Be a Couple and Still Be Free (New Page, 2002). “In successful instances, they’re clear about what they want and have the communication skills to find out quickly if the other person feels the same,” says Tessina.
Wanna guess which of these two types of pairs you’re more likely to see in divorce court? Yep, the couple who couldn’t keep their hands off each other. “The more passionate the courtship, the less likely the marriage is to last,” says Huston. After an overly idyllic courtship, these couples end up disillusioned, which often leads to marital problems. Another challenge for superfast couples is that “you’re marrying in the ‘honeymoon stage,’ when you see each other with rose-colored glasses, and the other can do no wrong,” says Catherine Burton, M.A., a marriage and family therapist in Dallas. However, couples who move quickly because they’ve found someone with standout-spouse qualities — being even-tempered, respectful and thoughtful — tend to have strong marriages.

If You Dated One to Three years
Couples who cruise through courtship at an average speed are most likely to be easygoing and levelheaded. Your stint as boyfriend and girlfriend lacked the drama that delays nuptials and the impetuousness that leads to presto engagements. You’re way more moderate, which may not make for the wildest stories, but “you don’t need so much drama in a marriage,” notes Huston. “Couples who dated one to three years before marrying develop an easy romantic friendship during their courtship. If you see it as a friendship, you miss the important romance element, but if you see it as a romance, you miss the essential friendship part.”
An ordinary courtship often precedes an extraordinary marriage, says Huston. Couples who progress at a steady pace tend to have sweet, low-key courtships followed by close and harmonious marriages. Unlike the speed daters, you’ve had the benefit of testing the waters with each other through key stages and you’ve had time to realize just how much you can lean on your partner.

If You Dated More Than Three Years
Fun- and freedom-lovers often end up taking it slow. Chances are that the two of you enjoy partying and traveling with your friends and prefer group outings to romantic date nights. But another type of couple can be slow to wed: That would be cautious folks (often because of being burned in the past). And the fact is, that’s not a bad thing, say the experts. “If you really want to know a person’s true nature, watch his actions over time,” says Burton. If you aren’t gun-shy and didn’t meet young, though, there’s a chance you’ve had a rocky relationship or a commitment issue slowing you down.
Okay, you already know the bad news: The slowest to marry tend to be the quickest to split. Huston found that pairs who had a long and tumultuous courtship (in other words, not merely drawn out but also full of drama) tended to be “early exiters,” divorcing within a few years of marriage. Why would couples who moved so cautiously toward the altar be so quick — and decisive! — about throwing in the towel? “It turns out that one of the main reasons for a long courtship is a deep ambivalence about marriage itself or about the person they’re marrying,” says Huston. And if you lived together, the cards may be more stacked against you. “Recent research has found that couples who lived together have a higher divorce rate than those who didn’t,” says Burton. The possible reason, she speculates, is that living together may create a template of sorts for a relationship with no commitment.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 11th, 2006 at 5:20 pm and is filed under Divorce Facts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.