The Heterogeneity of Relationship Patterns: An Examination of 15 Countries using Latent Class Growth Models

Studies on Europe and the U.S. indicate that marriage has been postponed, cohabitation has increased, and unions are more likely to dissolve. However, no study has been able to capture all of these dimensions simultaneously. Here we use latent class growth models to trace the complexity of union formation in the United States and 14 countries in Europe. We examine how union status can change between the ages of 15-45 for women born 1945-74. After determining the optimal number of latent classes, we calculate the probability of falling into each class by country and cohort. This shows the heterogeneity of union patterns across countries and over time. In all countries, changes in relationship patterns have been driven by the postponement of marriage, while premarital cohabitation and separation have varied more by region. Cohabitation has emerged as its own class but is not yet identical to marriage. Brienna Perelli-Harris is a Reader of Demography in the Division of Social Statistics and Demography at the University of Southampton and member of the ESRC Centre for Population Change. Brienna's research focusses on investigating changes in the family across countries. Change. Mark's research interests lie in the modelling of complex demographic and longitudinal data, with a particular interest in the application of multilevel models in the context of event history analysis. Ann Berrington. Models were estimated using the iridis-3 high performance computing facility at the University of Southampton. Thank you to everyone who helped collect, clean, and harmonize the Harmonized Histories data, especially Karolin Kubisch at MPIDR. The GGS data were obtained from the GGP Data Archive and refer to the publication that contains the model survey instruments:  Brienna Perelli-harris & Mark Lyons-Amos all rights reserved. Short sections of text, not to exceed two paragraphs, may be quoted without explicit permission provided that full credit, including  notice, is given to the source.