Premarital Counselling

What are the benefits of marriage?

Benefits of Marriage on Physical Health

• Married people live longer and are less likely to commit suicide than those who are not married.
• Married people have better emotional and physical health than unmarried people.
• Married people have the lowest incidences of diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease.
• Married men have lower levels of stress hormones.
• Those who are married report less depression than cohabiting couples.
• A study in 2016 found that married people have higher odds of surviving a heart attack.
• Other research has linked marriage with a lower risk of developing cancer and being diagnosed with dementia.
• Married cancer patients are more likely to survive the illness than those who are single and develop the disease. Death rates among unmarried cancer patients are higher, especially among single men.
• Married women are significantly less likely to be the victims of violent crime than single or divorced women.

Benefits of Marriage on Psychological Health

• Marriage provides partners with a sense of belonging.
• Married women experience less psychological distress.
• Married mothers feel more love and intimacy, less ambivalence, and experience less conflict with their husbands than cohabiting and single women do with their partners.
• Married mothers report less depression, more support from their partners, and more stable relationships than cohabiting mothers.
• Married people are least likely to commit suicide.
• Married people are much more likely to report being happy than cohabiters.
• Married mothers of infants have the most positive attitudes and report forming better home environments than single and cohabiting mothers.

Benefits of Marriage on Children

• Children with married parents have better emotional and physical health than those raised by single parents.
• Adolescents living with married parents are less likely to be depressed than those in stepfamilies or single-parent families.
• Children with married parents are more likely to stay in school and have fewer behavioural problems.
• Children with married parents are less vulnerable to serious emotional illness, depression and suicide.
• Children with married parents receive a model for their future marriage.
• Children from intact families are likely to have higher paying jobs as adults.

Benefits of Marriage on Finance

• Married people enjoy greater wealth than unmarried people, and the longer they stay married, the more their wealth accumulates.
• Married men earn more money than do single men with similar education and job histories.
• Married women are economically better off than divorced, cohabiting or never-married women.

Benefits of Marriage on Society

• Adolescents living with married parents are less likely to be depressed than those in stepfamilies or single-parent families.
• Married women are significantly less likely to be the victims of violent crime than single or divorced women.
• Being married changes people’s lifestyles and habits in ways that are personally and socially beneficial.
• Communities with more married-parent families will be safer and better places to live because they are less likely to by plagued by substance abuse and crimes committed by young people.
• Married people have better health than unmarried people and so societal healthcare costs are lower.