Modern 18 to 29
year-olds value
parenthood above
marriage, says a Pew
Research survey
examining
generational
attitudes towards
marriage and family.
While more than half
of Millennials (52
percent) say that
being a good parent
“is one of the most
important things in
life,” less than a
third (30 percent)
say the same about
having a successful
marriage. This
indicates, Pew says,
a 22-point gap
between the two
items.
When compared with
18 to 29 year-olds
polled in
1997—members of
Generation X—results
indicate that young
people today may
place a lower
priority on
marriage, while
placing a higher
premium on
parenthood, than did
their predecessors.
Poll results from
1997 indicate that
less than half (42
percent) of members
of Generation X said
that one of the most
important things in
life is being a good
parent, while more
than a third (35
percent) said the
same about being
successfully
married,
demonstrating a
seven-point gap.
Why does there seem
to a reversal in
attitudes?
Generation X seemed
to value parenthood
less than a
successful marriage,
while Generation Y
puts less value on
marriage than on
parenthood.
Psychotherapist
Tina
B. Tessina, Ph.D.,
author of Money,
Sex and Kids: Stop
Fighting about the
Three Things That
Can Ruin Your
Marriage, says
that Millennials
have few models of
good marriages to
follow or admire.
“Many Millennials
have grown up in
divorced or single
parent households,
so they have little
experience of what
good marriages look
like,” she explains.
“Even if their own
parents' marriage is
intact, they're
surrounded by peers
whose parents—and
they themselves—are
having relationship
disasters.”
Combine personal
experiences with
what Millennials see
happening in society
at large, and it
seems as if a happy
marriage is
difficult to
successfully
sustain.
“The media has a lot
of focus on
celebrities whose
relationships are
dysfunctional, and
reality TV thrives
on bad relationships
featuring
emotionally immature
and dysfunctional
people,” Tessina
maintains.
All of these poor
examples have made
this group
“gun-shy,” she
contends.
“Where will they get
their images of what
functional
relationships and
healthy marriages
look like? They will
have to learn as
they go, which means
having a number of
bad relationships
before they figure
out how to create a
good one, and how to
choose a good
partner,” Tessina
says.
Web communications
expert, Rodney
Echols is a thirty
two year-old married
father of a two
year-old boy.
“I have friends on
both ends and I
really witnessed the
changing of the
generational
perspectives,” he
says. “I went to a
small private
school, but I still
witnessed the
pattern of younger
and younger kids
experiencing sex
earlier and more
single mothers
raising kids on
their own. In my
twenties, as a
dating adult in a
major US
metropolitan
environment, it was
rare to meet a
single available
woman who had
reached her
mid-twenties who did
not have some kind
of baby-mama drama
going on.”
Like Tessina, Echols
partly holds the
media responsible
for changing
attitudes. He claims
popular talk shows
make marriage seem
unrelated to having
children.
”It seemed as though
the Ricki Lake and
Jerry Springer media
impressions of
single-parent homes
had all desensitized
a whole generation
to the challenges of
starting a family
out of wedlock,” he
says.
Mike
Hais,
PhD, co-author with
Morley Winograd of
the forthcoming Millennial
Momentum: How a New
Generation is
Remaking America,
says that general
theorists label
Millennials as a
“civic generation,”
thus influencing
their attitudes
towards family
structure.
“The last previous
American civic
generation was the
GI or Greatest
Generation,” Hais
explains.
“Historically, civic
generations are slow
to marry and to have
children, something
that is clearly
reflected in the Pew
research. This
slowness to marry
and have children
was as true for the
GI Generation in the
1930s and 1940s as
it is for
Millennials now.”
Civic generations
come of age during
times of national
crisis, he notes,
and they tend “to be
careful, outwardly
focused and
conventional during
their youth.” As
they age, Hais
suggests,
Millennials
attitudes may
change.
“Once they are in
position to focus on
both marriage and
child rearing they
will do so just as
the GI Generation
did during the 1950s
and 1960s,” he
concludes. “Remember
that the parents of
the Baby Boomer
Generation, the
largest American
generation before
the Millennials,
were primarily from
the GI Generation.”
