Some people think living together is a good way to find out if a couple is suitable for marriage. But is it? Is living together a good test for marriage? “ I wouldn’t dream of marrying someone I hadn’t lived with,” young people often say today. “ That’s like buying a pair of shoes you haven’t tried on.”
Sounds good, doesn’t it? A couple can try living together first. If they find they get along well, they get married. If not, they go their separate ways. They find out before they marry if they’ll do well together. And that should cut down on the number of divorces. Right?
Wrong, say scientists Jeffrey Jacques (杰弗里·雅克) and Karen Chason (卡伦·蔡森)of Florida A&M University (佛罗里达州农业机械大学). They studied two groups of students married for at least 13 months. In one, the couples had lived together before becoming married; in the other, they had not. The scientists say they could find few differences between the couples. Satisfaction with the marriage was not higher (or reduced) if the couple had lived together before marriage. Neither was dissatisfaction — as many couples in one group as in the other seemed faced with problems or divorce.
The scientists suggest, based on their results, that the types of learning that occur when living together aren’t as useful for marriage as we usually think. They don’t work against a successful marriage, but they don’t work for one either. Living together, as a way of testing suitability for marriage, hasn’t really met the test.
Why doesn’t a period of living together change the marriage experience? For one thing, both people know that it’s only a time to try things out. Either person can leave at any time. The woman doesn’t have to put up with a man who treats her badly; the man doesn’t have to put up with a woman who is always emotional. Both may tend to act their best. And, since it is only for a short time, both may find it easier to put up with problems that would be impossible to bear if a shared lifetime was ahead.
Then there’s the matter of money. Outside of marriage, money tends to be “his” or “hers”. Costs may be shared, but the future isn’t a problem if she spends more than she can afford on clothes, or if he always loses on the horses. It’s different after they’re married and saving for a house and children. Then each is angry when the other spends too much money.
Relatives are seldom a problem when a couple is living together — they often object to the situation and stay away from the couple. Only after marriage do the relatives come in and cause arguments and tears.
Living together, it seems, prepares one for a future living-together situation with someone else. It appears to bear little relation to happiness in marriage.
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Live Together First?
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